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COUSIN PONS. 


A NOVEL. 


TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF 


Honore De Balzac 


WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY ELIAS J. WHITNEY. 



i 



NEW YORK: 

ROBERT BONNER’S SONS, 

PUBLISHERS. 


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, TS 2-2. (o 




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BY ROBERT BONNER’S SONS. 


(All rights reserved.) 




< 

4 <■ O 



COUSIN PONS. 


CHAPTER I. 

A GLORIOUS RELIC OF THE EMPIRE.” 



OWARD three o’clock in the afternoon 
of a certain day in October, 1844, a 
man, whose age was about sixty 
(though every one would have taken 
him to be older), might have been 
seen wending his way along the 
Boulevard des Italiens. His nose 
was in the air and his lips were 
pursed up, like those of a merchant 
who has just struck a good bargain, 
or of a young man leaving a lady’s bower, in high 
good-humor with himself. Now, at Paris, this eleva- 
tion of the nose and pursing of the lips are the strong- 
est indications of self-satisfaction that a man can 
possibly exhibit. 



8 


“ A GLORIOUS RELIC OF THE EMPIRE. 




So soon as those persons, who, seated on chairs, line 
the Boulevard des Italiens, day after day, and resign 
themselves to the charm of analyzing the passers-by, had 
caught sight of the old man in the distance, that pecu- 
liar smile, which characterizes the denizen of Paris, 
began to steal over their faces. ’Tis a smile that teems 
with irony, ridicule or sympathy, according to circum- 
stances ; but only rare and living curiosities can sum- 
mon it to the features of the Parisian, whose eyes are 
feasted, even to satiety, with every species of spectacle. 

A certain smart retort will explain the value, from an 
archaeological point of view, of this old fellow, and the 
cause of the smile which, on his appearance, flashed, 
echo-like, from face to face. Hyacinthe, an actor, cele- 
brated for his sallies, being asked, on a certain occasion, 
where he had those hats made, the mere sight of which 
was wont to set the play-house in a roar, replied, “ I do 
not get them made ; I keep them.” Even so, among the 
million actors of whom the Grand Parisian Company 
consists, there is full many an unconscious Hyacinthe 
who, retaining in his attire all the absurdities of some 
particular period, bursts upon your astonished gaze, the 
complete personification of an epoch, as, chewing the 
cud of bitter grief over the treachery of some quondam 
friend, you are sauntering along, and extorts from you 
a burst of merriment. 

By preserving, in certain details of his apparel, a 
quixotic fidelity to the fashions of the year 1806, the 
pedestrian in question recalled, without being a positive 
caricature of, the imperial era ; and herein lies a distinc- 
tion the subtilty of which lends, in the eye of a close 
observer, a peculiar value to apparitions of this kind. 
But the combination of minute details, to which we are 
now referring, would fail to arrest the attention of per- 


9 


“ A GLORIOUS RELIC OF THE EMPIRE.” 

sons not endowed with the analytic power that distin- 
guishes the connoisseur in fldnerie ; and, to evoke 
laughter while he was still at a distance, our pedestrian 
must have presented some such glaring extravagance of 
garb as actors aim at in order to secure a round of 
applause when first they step on to the stage. And such 
a glaring extravagance this pedestrian did indeed 
exhibit. Over a greenish coat, garnished with buttons 
of white metal, this lean and gaunt old man wore a 
hazel-colored spencer ! A man with a spencer in 1844 ! 
Why, ’tis much the same thing as if Napoleon Bonaparte 
had deigned to revisit the glimpses of the sun for a 
couple of hours ! 

' The spencer, as its name imports, was invented by a 
certain lord who was, doubtless, vain of his good figure. 
Before the peace of Amiens, the Englishman in question 
had solved the problem how to cover the upper part of 
the body without overwhelming it beneath the weight of 
that hideous box-coat which is now wearing out the 
remnant of its days on the backs of the old hackney- 
coachmen of Paris. But since fine figures are the excep- 
tion, not the rule, the spencer, as a fashion for the male 
sex, had, in spite of its English origin, but a transient 
triumph in France. 

At sight of this spencer, the men of from forty to fifty 
indulged their fancies by dressing its wearer in imagin- 
ary top-boots and imaginary breeches of green kersey- 
mere, tied with an imaginary bunch of ribbons, and thus 
once more beheld themselves in the costume of their 
youth ; the old ladies called to mind their former con- 
quests ; while, as for the young men, they simply asked 
themselves why this aged Alcibiades had, cut away the 
tail of his overcoat. So thoroughly was the whole aspect 
of the old man in keeping with the spencer that you 


10 ‘‘a glorious relic of the empire.” 

would at once have pronounced him to be an Empire- 
man, just as we are in the habit of talking about Empire- 
furniture. But he was a symbol of the Empire to those 
only, who, having known that magnificent and imposing 
epoch, at least de visu, possessed the indispensable quali- 
fication of a somewhat accurate recollection of its 
fashions. The interval of time that separates us from 
the Empire is already so wide that it is not given to 
every one to recall it, in all its Gallo-Greek reality. 

In the indulgence of that species of bravado adopted 
by the bureaucracy and civilians in general under the 
Empire, by way of retort to the bravado of military men, 
this old fellow carried his hat upon the back of his head, 
so as to expose almost the whole of his forehead. The 
hat, moreover, was a shocking twelve-and-sixpenny silk 
hat, whose nether brim two large long ears had stained 
with whitish splotches that defied the brush, while the 
silken covering of the hat, having been, as usual, unskil- 
fully applied to the pasteboard shape, was puckered 
here and there, and seemed, in spite of the careful hand 
that groomed it morning after morning, to be suffering 
from an attack of leprosy. 

Beneath this hat, thus precariously worn, stretched a 
sheepish comical face, such as you may see upon the 
shoulders of a Chinese squab, and nowhere else. This 
vast visage, which was as full of pits as a skimming-ladle 
is full of holes — of pits so deep that they actually cast 
shadows — resembled a Roman mask dug out of the 
earth, and violated every rule of anatomy. Scan the 
features as you might, your eye discovered not a trace 
of frame-work in them. Bones the face seemingly had 
none, but where they should have been, your eye encoun- 
tered flat gelatinous curves of flesh, and wandered thence, 
to find flaccid spherical knobs usurping the place of 


11 


‘‘a glorious relic of the empire.” 

what, in any ordinary physiognomy, would have been a 
hollow ; while, like some erratic bowlder that commands 
a plain, a huge Don Quixote nose — the kind of nose 
which (as Cervantes must have noticed) indicates a con- 
genital devotion to noble aims, that is apt to degenerate 
into gullibility — stood boldly out, the most prominent 
feature in this grotesque countenance, through which, as 
through a large flat toad-stool, peered a pair of sad gray 
eyes, surmounted by two red lines that did duty for 
eyebrows. The ugliness of this old man, however (all 
comic as it was), did not excite derision ; the extreme 
melancholy that welled over from the poor fellow’s faded 
eyes appealed directly to the scoffer’s heart, and froze 
the joke upon his lips. The thought would at once sug- 
gest itself, that Nature had peremptorily forbidden this 
poor creature, under pain of exciting a woman’s laugh- 
ter or disgust, to breathe a single syllable of love. In 
the presence of such a misfortune a Frenchman is dumb ; 
for, to a Frenchman, the most cruel of all misfortunes 
is — to lack the power to win a woman’s favor! 

The dress of this man, thus branded by the hand of 
Nature, was that of all poor gentlemen — a class which 
the wealthy often strive to ape. Over his shoes he wore 
a pair of gaiters, which were fashioned like those of the 
Imperial Guard, and doubtlessly helped him to keep 
down his washing-bill. There were reddish tints about 
his black cloth trousers, each white and shiny fold of 
which said, as plainly as their cut, that three years had 
elapsed since they were bought. Ample as they were, 
they failed to conceal a certain leanness, which (to judge 
from the old fellow’s sensual mouth, whose full, thick 
lips disclosed, at every smile, two rows of pearl-white 
teeth that would have done no discredit to a shark) was 
the result of a constitutional tendency rather than of a 


12 “a glorious relic of the empire.” 

Pythagorean diet. Beneath his double-breasted waist- 
coat of black cloth he wore a second waistcoat, which 
was white, and beneath this, again, in the third rank, 
blazed the red margin of a knitted vest ; so that one was 
irresistibly reminded of Garat’s five waistcoats. An 
enormous white muslin cravat, whose pretentious bow 
had been devised by some dandy to charm “ the charm- 
ing women ” of the year 1809, rose so high above the old 
man’s chin that his face seemed, as it were, ingulfed in 
the folds of the cravat. A chain of plaited silk, to imi- 
tate hair, spanned the old man’s shirt-front, and protected 
his watch from a robbery that no one was likely to 
attempt. His greenish coat, though irreproachably tidy, 
was some three years senior to the trousers ; but its 
black velvet collar and white metal buttons had been 
recently renewed, and thus told a tale of minute domestic 
carefulness. 

This trick of fixing the hat upon the occiput, the triple 
waistcoat, the immense cravat in which the chin lay 
buried, the gaiters, the metal buttons on the greenish 
coat — all these insignia of the fashions of the Empire 
harmonized with the exploded perfumes of Incroyable 
foppery, with an indefinable tenuity in the folds of the 
old man’s garments, and a certain all-pervading prim- 
ness and precision that recalled the school of David and 
the fragile furniture of Jacob. Nor did it require a 
second glance to discover that the person thus attired 
was either a gentleman governed by some secret vice, or 
one of those men with small fixed incomes, whose expen- 
diture is restrained by the scantiness of their resources 
within limits so narrow and so nicely adjusted that a 
broken pane, a torn coat, or that philanthropic pestilence 
— a collection for the poor — will leave them without 
pocket-money for a whole month. 


13 


“a glorious relic of the empire.” 

Had you been upon the spot, you would assuredly 
have asked yourself how it came to pass that a smile 
was lighting up this uncouth countenance, whose habit- 
ual cast, like that of all who are involved in an obscure 
struggle for the common necessaries of life, would nat- 
urally be cold and sad. But had you noticed the mater- 
nal care bestowed by this singular old man upon the 
evidently valuable object which he was holding in his 
right hand, beneath the two left skirts of his double coat, 
in order to guard the treasure from casual blows ; and, 
more especially, had you observed that his face wore the 
busy look assumed by the idler, when engaged in the 
execution of a commission, you would have surmised 
that the old man must have recovered some article as 
precious as the lap-dog of a marchioness ; and that, with 
all the bustling gallantry of an Empire-man, he was con- 
veying it in triumph to the “ charming woman ” of sixty, 
who has not yet learned to dispense with the daily visit 
of her admirer. Paris is the only city in the world in 
which you can encounter such scenes — scenes which con- 
vert its boulevards into a perpetual drama, acted by the 
French people, gratis, for the benefit of Art. 


14 ‘‘the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 


CHAPTER II. 

“ THE END OF A WINNER OF THE GRAND PRIX DE ROME.” 

Judging from the build of this raw-boned person, you 
would have experienced some difficulty, the audacious 
spencer notwithstanding, in classing him among the 
artists of Paris — a body of iiien who closely resemble 
the Parisian street Arab, in so far as they possess the 
privilege of working the imaginations of sober-sided 
citizens into ecstasies of what, since the old drolatic 
word mirobolant has been restored to its ancient honors, 
may be termed most mirobolant mirth. Yet an artist our 
pedestrian undoubtedly was, and a grand-prize man to 
boot ; the composer of the cantata which, first after the 
re-establishment of the Academie de Rome, carried off 
the laurel at the Institute — in short, this pedestrian was 
no less a man than M. Sylvain Pons ! the composer of 
certain celebrated romances which our mothers used to 
warble, of two or three operas which were put upon the 
stage in 1815 and 1816, and of sundry unpublished scores 
besides. Now, in the latter Autumn of his life, this 
worthy man was conductor of the orchestra of a boule- 
vard theater. Thanks to his ugliness, he also held the 
post of music-master in several boarding-schools for 
young ladies. His salary and fees for out-door lessons 
were his only sources of revenue. An out-door tutor at 
his time of life ! What a world of mysteries in that 
prosaic position ! 

Thus, then, this last of the spencer-wearers bore, upon • 
his outer man, something beyond the mere symbols of 


‘'the end of a winner of the grand prix.’’ 15 

the imperial epoch. There was a grand lesson to be 
learned from the three waistcoats which he wore. He 
exhibited himself, gratis, as one of the numerous victims 
of the sinister and fatal system called competition, 
which, after a barren probation of one hundred years, 
still reigns supreme in France. This Intelligence-Press 
was invented by Poisson de Marigny, Mme. de Pompa- 
dour’s brother, who, in or about the year 1746, was 
appointed director of the Fine Arts. Now just cast up 
— you may do it on your fingers — the names of the men of 
genius furnished to us from the ranks of the laureates 
during the past century. In the first place, let govern- 
ments 'and academies do what they will, it is impossible 
that their combinations should do the work of those 
miracles of chance to which great men owe their origin. 
That origin is, of all the mysteries of generation, the 
most inscrutable to the all-searching analysis which we, 
in these modern times, have set on foot. Again, the 
Egyptians are said to have invented ovens for hatching 
chickens ; now what would you think of these Egyptians 
if they had omitted to provide these chickens with 
appropriate food so soon as they were hatched ? Yet it 
is precisely thus that France is acting. She first 
endeavors to produce artists by means of the hot- 
house of competition ; and then, the sculptor, painter, 
engraver or composer, once manufactured by this purely 
mechanical process, she recks as little of him as the 
evening dandy recks of the flowers with which he decked 
his button-hole in the morning. It turns out, after all, 
that the real men of talent are Greuze or Watteau, 
Felicien David or Pagnest, Gericault or Decamps, 
Auber or David d’Angers, Eugene Delacroix or Meisso- 
nier — men who trouble themselves little about grand 


16 “the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 

prizes, men who are reared in the open air under the 
rays of that invisible sun which is called — Vocation. 

From Rome (whither he was sent to be manufactured 
into a great musician) Sylvain Pons brought back a 
taste for antiquities and beautiful works of art. He had 
a wonderful amount of knowledge concerning all those 
objects (master-pieces of the hand and of the fancy) 
which have recently acquired, in popular parlance, the 
collective appellation of bric-a-brac. 

Thus, then, it came to pass that, in the year i8io, this 
son of Euterpe returned to Paris, an enthusiastic col- 
lector, laden with pictures and picture-frames, statuettes, 
sculptures in ivory and wood, enamels, china, etc. 
These various acquisitions, together with the cost of 
their carriage, had absorbed the major part of Pons’ 
patrimony. The fortune which he had inherited from 
his mother he had spent in a similar manner, during 
the tour which he made in Italy, after the expiration of 
his three years oflfitial residence in Rome. He wished 
to pay a leisurely visit to 'Venice, Milan, Florence, 
Bologna and Naples, sojourning in each of those cities 
as a dreamer and philosopher, with all the heedlessness 
of an artist who looks to his talent for a livelihood, just 
as a courtesan counts upon her beauty. 

During this glorious journey Pons was as happy as a 
man can be, who, while full of feeling and of delicacy, 
is debarred, by his excessive plainness, from “ success 
with women ” (to use the phrase current in the year of 
grace 1809), and who finds the realities of life altogether 
inferior to his ideal. But Pons had settled in his own 
mind how to deal with the discord that existed between 
the pitch of his heart and that of the external world. It 
was, doubtlessly, in this correct appreciation of the 
beautiful, lying pure and fresh in the very depths of his 



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‘^THE END OF A WINNER OF THE GRAND PRIX.’’ 17 

heart, that those ingenious, subtle and graceful melo- 
dies, which earned for him the reputation that he enjoyed 
from i8io to 1814, had their source. When any one 
becomes famous in France, through a certain vogue, 
from the fashion of the hour, from the ephemeral follies 
of the metropolis, lo ! up springs a crop of Ponses. No 
country under the sun is so severe toward. all that is truly 
great ; so contemptuously indulgent toward all that is 
really little. It is possible that Pons, though quickly 
overtaken by floods of German harmony and the florid 
fertility of the Rossinian school, may, even so late as 
the year 1824, have been recognized as an agreeable 
composer, and known to fame as the author of a few 
romances (his last productions of the kind); but judge 
what must have been his position in 1831 ! As for his 
position in 1844 — the year that ushered in the one single 
stirring incident of his obscure existence — he was then 
reduced to the value of an antediluvian quaver. In that 
year, although he still composed, for a trifling remuner- 
ation, divers pieces for his own theater and two or three 
neighboring theaters, his very existence was utterly 
unknown to the music-sellers. 

But in spite of this neglect the worthy man did ample 
justice to contemporary masters of his art. The able 
execution of some choice morceaux would bring tears to 
his eyes. Yet his religious enthusiasm did not, as in 
the case of Hoffman’s Kreislers, reach the verge of 
insanity ; Pons veiled his raptures ; his enjoyment, like 
that of the Hashish-eater and the Theriaki, was purely 
internal. Now, the genius of admiration, of compre- 
hension — the only faculty that renders an ordinary man 
the brother of a great creator — is so rare in Paris (where 
idea succeeds idea as traveler succeeds traveler at an 
inn) that Pons has a claim upon our respectful esteem. 


18 “the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 

The worthy fellow’s failure may appear unnatural ; but 
he himself candidly admitted his weakness as a harmon- 
ist ; he had neglected the study of counterpoint ; and 
thus, when, by dint of renewed application, he might 
have maintained his rank among modern composers, and 
become — not a Rossini indeed, but — a Herold, the 
orchestration of these more modern times, with its meas- 
ureless development, seerried to Pons to be beyond his 
reach. Indeed, he found, in the pleasures of a collector 
of curiosities, so vast a set-off against his bankruptcy of 
glory, that, had he been compelled to choose between 
the possession of his curiosities and the fame of Rossini, 
he would have preferred — will it be believed ? — his dar- 
ling cabinet ! In forming his collection, the old com- 
poser put into practice the axiom of Chenavard, that 
learned collector of choice engravings, who maintained 
that one can derive no pleasure from gazing at a 
Ruysdael, a Hobbema, a Holbein, a Raphael, a Murillo, 
a Greuze, a Sebastian del Piombo, a Giorgione or an 
Albert Durer, if the cost of its purchase exceeded fifty 
francs. Pons did not recognize the possibility of giving 
more than a hundred francs for any object whatever ; 
and to induce him to give even fifty francs for one, it 
must have been worth, at least, three thousand. The 
most beautiful thing in the world, if its price amounted 
to three hundred francs, had no existence for Pons. 
Passing rare, indeed, had been his opportunities ; but 
the three essentials to success were his. He had the 
legs of a stag, the leisure of the flaneur^ and the patience 
of the Jew ! 

This system, pursued during a period of forty years, 
not at Paris only, but also at Rome, had borne fruit. By 
spending about two thousand francs on bric-^-brac in 
each year since his return from Rome, Pons had amassed 


“the end of a winner of the grand prix.’’ 19 

a complete collection of masterpieces, the catalogue of 
which reached the fabulous figure 1907. Between 1811 
and 1816, in the course of his wanderings through Paris, 
he had picked up, for ten francs apiece, various objects, 
each of which would, nowadays, be worth from athous- 
and to twelve hundred francs. His collection consisted 
partly of pictures culled from among the forty-five 
thousand which are annually put up for sale in the auc- 
tion-rooms of Paris ; partly of soft Sevres porcelain 
purchased from the hardy children of Auvergne — those 
satellites of the Bande-Noire who brought the marvels 
of Pompadour-France to Paris in wagons. In short, 
Pons had collected the relics of the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries ;* doing full justice to the talent and 
genius of the French school, to the Lepautres, the 
Lavallee-Poussins, etc. — those Great-Unknowns, who 
created the style Louis-Quinze and the style Louis-Seize, 
and whose works form the basis of the so-called inven- 
tions of the artists of to-day, who are to be seen stoop- 
ing perpetually over the treasures of the Cabinet des 
Estampes, with a view to the production of original 
works, which are simply — clever imitations ! 

For many of his knicknacks Pons was indebted to those 
exchanges which are a source of unspeakable delight to 
the collector ; for the pleasure of buying curiosities is, 
after all, merely a secondary pleasure ; the prime, the 
principal, pleasure is, to barter them. Pons it was, 
who first set the example of collecting snuff-boxes and 
miniatures ; but, unknown to fame as a bric-a-brac- 
ologist (for he neither attended sales nor frequented the 
shops of the well-known dealers), he was entirely 
ignorant of the marketable value of his treasures. 

The late Dusommerard had done his utmost to strike 
up an intimacy with the old composer ; but the prince 


20 “the end of a winner of the grand PRIX.” 

of bric-a-brac died without having succeeded in gain- 
ing access to the Pons Museum — the only museum that 
will bear comparison with the celebrated collection of 
M. Sauvageot, between whom and Pons (as between their 
respective museums) there were certain points of resem- 
blance. For M. Sauvageot, like Pons, was a musician of 
limited means, who, fired by Pons’ love of art and Pons’ 
hatred of the illustrious plutocrats who form cabinets 
of antiquities in order that they may enter into adroit 
competition with the regular dealers, has adopted Pons’ 
system and method of procedure. For all these speci- 
mens of cunning workmanship, these miracles of indus- 
try, Pons (in common with his rival, his competitor, his 
antagonist) cherished in his heart a passion insatiable as 
that of the miser, strong as that of a lover fora beautiful 
mistress. As for a re-sale in the auction-rooms of the 
Rue des Jeuneurs, under the hammer of the auctioneer, 
that seemed to Pons to amount to nothing less than the 
crime of Lese-bric-a-brac ! He kept his museum with 
the intention of deriving from it hourly pleasure ; for 
those minds which Nature has endowed with the power 
of admiring great works of art possess the sublime 
faculty of the genuine lover. The object of their pas- 
sion yields to them the self-same pleasure yesterday, 
to-day and forever. Satiety is unknown to them ; and 
masterpieces, fortunately, are perennially young. 

From all that precedes, the reader will gather that the 
object which the old man was carrying with such pater- 
nal care was one of those dazzling “ finds ” which we 
bear off — with how much rapture, you, oh, ye amateurs ! 
understand full well ! 

At the first outlines of this biographical sketch, every 
reader will be tempted to exclaim : “Well, in spite of 
his ugliness, this must be the happiest fellow in the 


“the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 21 

world.” And it is undoubtedly true that a mental 
counter-irritant, in the form of a mania, is a sovereign 
remedy for ennui and the spleen. All ye who can no 
longer drink from that vessel which has in every age 
been termed the cup of pleasure, ^PP^y yourselves to the 
task of collecting — no matter what ; even postage- 
stamps have been collected — and you will find the solid 
ingot of happiness coined into small change. A mania ! 
why, ’tis pleasure idealized ! Do not, however, envy the 
worthy Pons, since here, as in all kindred cases, the 
feeling would be based upon a misconception. 

For this man, wjio was the very incarnation of deli- 
cacy — this man, whose moral being drew its only susten- 
ance from an unwearied admiration of the finest achieve- 
ments of human toil — that glorious struggle with the 
forces of Nature — was the slave of that sin which, of all 
the seven deadly sins, God will surely punish with 
the least severity: Pons was a gourmand. His slender 
means, combined with his passion for bric-a-brac, entailed 
upon him a dietetic rigime so thoroughly distasteful to 
his appreciative ‘palate that at the outset the old bache- 
lor had solved the difficulty by dining out every day of 
his life. Now, in the days of the Empire, celebrities, 
either on account of their scarcity and their slender 
political pretensions or for some other reason, were in 
far greater request than they are in this degenerate age ; 
and moreover, it was so easy to achieve reputation as a 
poet, an author, or a musician, then ! In those days 
Pons, who was regarded as a probable rival of the 
Nicolos, the Paers and the Bertons, received so many 
invitations that he was compelled to jot them down in a 
memorandum-book, just as an advocate makes a note of 
the cases to which he has to attend. By way of sup- 
porting his character as an artist, Pons presented copies 


22 “the end of a winnp:e of the grand pkix.’’ 

of his musical romances to all his Amphitryons ; played 
the piano for them ; brought them tickets for boxes at 
the Feydeau (one of the theaters for which he worked), 
got up concerts at their houses, and would sometimes — 
when he was among relatives — even improvise a little 
ball, and fiddle for the dancers with his own illustrious 
fingers. Those were the days when the finest men in 
France used to exchange sword-cuts with the finest 
men of the coalition ; hence Pons’ ugliness passed for 
originality, in accordance with the grand law promul- 
gated by Moliere in the famous couplet that he has put 
into the mouth of Eliante. When Pons had rendered a 
service to some fine woman^ he would sometimes hear 
himself styled “a charming man but that phrase was 
the Ultima Thule of his good fortune. 

During this phase of his existence — a phase that lasted 
for about six years — that is to say, from i8io till i8i6 — 
Pons contracted the fatal habit of dining well, at the 
expense of hosts who never counted cost, who procured 
first fruits for him, uncorked for him their choicest 
wines, set before him the most exquisite deserts, coffee 
and liqueurs, and, in short, treated him as hosts did treat 
their guests under the Empire, that epoch when many 
a private household imitated the splendor of the kings 
and queens of whom Paris was then full, even to over- 
flowing. For in those days it was the fashion to play at 
the game of royalty just as it is now the fashion to play 
at the game of Parliament, by creating a host of socie- 
ties with their presidents, vice-presidents and secretaries ; 
such as the Flax Society, the Vinicultural Society, the 
Sericicultural Society, the Agricultural Society, the 
Industrial Society, and so forth ; until at length the 
craze has risen to such a pitch that we are actually on. 


“the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 23 

the hunt for social evils, in order that we may form the 
doctors of those evils into a society ! 

A stomach trained as Pons’ stomach had been trained, 
exercises an evitable influence on the moral nature of 
a man, and corrupts him in direct proportion to the profi- 
ciency of his stomach in things culinary. Sensuality, lurk- 
ing in every corner of the heart, holds undisputed sway, 
boldly combats the dictates of the will, drowns the voice of 
honor, and insists, at all costs, on the satisfaction of its 
cravings. No pen has ever yet described the exactions 
of the gullet ; under the specious guise of the necessity 
of supporting life, they escape the eye of literary criticism. 
Yet the number of persons who have been ruined by the 
table is incalculable. From this point of view the table, 
at Paris, is the rival of the courtesan. The former repre- 
sents income, and the latter expenditure. When Pons, 
declining as his reputation declined, sunk from the 
position of an ever-welcome guest to that of a mere par- 
asite, he found himself unable to exchange the well- 
spread board for the Spartan broth of an eighteen-penny 
eating-house. Unhappy wight • He shuddered at the 
thought that his independence could be secured only at 
so great a sacrifice. He felt that, rather than forego his- 
habitual good cheer, the regular succession of each 
“ earliest arrival ” in the market, the delicate and dainty 
little dishes, in short, which (to employ a vulgar but 
expressive term) he was accustomed to guzzle, he was 
capable of making the meanest concessions. True bird 
of plunder, flying away when his crop was full, and 
warbling an air by way of thanks. Pons even found a cer- 
tain pleasure in living well at the expense of that society 
which demanded of him— what? Empty compliments. 
Like all bachelors who hate their own domiciles, and 
pass their lives in the domiciles of others, Pons was 


24 ‘‘the end of a winner of the grand prix/’ 

well versed in those conventional forms and social gri' 
maces which, in the world, pass muster for sentiments, 
and he would tender compliments as a sort of small 
change. Persons he judged as if they had been sacks 
with labels on them ; he trusted implicitly to the label, 
and thrust no curious hand into the sack. 

This very tolerable state of affairs lasted for a decade. 
But what a decade it was ! It was a rainy autumn, 
throughout the whole of which Pons, by dint of render- 
ing himself indispensable in all the houses that he fre- 
quented, contrived to dine gratis. But it was a sinister 
career on which he embarkedwhen he began to undertake 
the execution of innumerable commissions and to dis- 
charge, many a time and oft, the functions of a hall 
porter or a domestic servant. Repeatedly intrusted with 
the carrying out of purchases, he became the spy — of one 
family upon another. Yet his manifold journeys and 
meannesses procured him no credit whatever. “ Pons is 
a bachelor ” ( so the phrase would run ), “ and doesn’t 
know what on earth to do with his time ; he’s only too 
glad to trot to and fro for us. But for that what would 
become of him ?” 

Nor was the chill that old age diffuses around it slow 
in setting in. ’Tis a contagious east wind, producing its 
depressing effects upon the moral temperature, especially 
when the old man, who brings the chill with him, is 
poor and plain. For to be old and poor and plain — is 
not that a threefold poverty ? This, then, was the win- 
ter of Pons’ life — winter, red-nosed winter, with its pal- 
lid cheeks and multiform numbnesses. 

From 1836 till 1843 the invitations addressed to Pons 
were few and far between. The families which still 
admitted him to their tables, far from courting the 
society of the parasite, now merely tolerated it, just as 


“the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 25 

we tolerate a tax ; while, as to giving Pons any credit 
for his services — even for his substantial services — no one 
ever even dreamed of such a thing. The family circles, 
in which the old man’s orbit lay, had no respect what- 
ever for the Arts, worshiped nothing save tangible 
results, and valued those things — and those things 
only — which they had won for themselves since the Rev- 
olution of July ; in other words, wealth and a conspicu- 
ous social position. Now, since Pons was deficient in that 
elevation of mind and manner which inspires the bour- 
geois bosom with respectful fear, he had now, naturally 
enough, sunk some degrees below zero, though without 
becoming an object of absolute contempt. Keen indeed 
was the torture to which he was exposed in the bourgeois 
circle that he frequented ; but, like all timid persons, he 
concealed his sufferings, and finally acquired a habit of 
suppressing his feelings and turning his heart into a 
kind of sanctuary wherein he would lake refuge. Now, 
this is a phenomenon which many superficial per- 
sons translate by the word egotism, and it must be 
admitted that the resemblance between the hermit and 
the egotist is sufficiently , striking to give these calum- 
niators a show of reason as against the man of feeling ; 
especially at Paris, where the citizen of the world observes 
nothing, where all is rapid as the rolling wave, and fleet- 
ing as — a Ministry ! 

Thus, then, it happened that on the indictment — the 
retrospective indictment — for egotism preferred against 
him. Cousin Pons was found guilty ; for society, in the 
long run, invariably convicts those whom it has once 
accused. Is it possible to gauge the crushing influence 
upon the timid of undeserved disfavor? Who can hope 
to succeed in painting the misfortunes of Timidity? 
This situation— a situation which, day by day, was grow- 


26 “the end of a winner of the grand prix.” 

ing worse — will account for the dejection stamped upon 
the features of this poor musician, who was living upon 
concessions that were most degrading. Still, every base 
compliance extorted by a passion from its subject is a 
bond of union ; the greater its demands, the stronger are 
the links that bind you to it ; every sacrifice you make 
tends to form a negative, imaginary hoard which looks 
to you like untold wealth. When some bourgeois^ spa- 
cious in the possession of — stupidity — had bestowed 
upon Pons a glance of insolent patronage, how revenge- 
fully would the old musician sip his glass of port, and 
roll the quail au gratin on his tongue, with the mut- 
tered reflection: “After all, I have not paid for this 
too dearly !“ 

Still, even in this existence, the eye of the moralist 
will detect some extenuating circumstances. A certain 
amount of satisfied desire is essential to the sustenance 
of life. A passionless man, the just man made perfect, 
is “a faultless monster,” a semi-angel with undeveloped 
wings. Angels are all head in the Catholic mythology ; 
but here on earth the just man made perfect is that 
insufferable Grandison, for whom the Venus of the 
crossways would find herself unsexed. Now, if we 
except the few commonplace adventures that Pons had 
met with in the course of his Italian tour — adventures 
that ought to be ascribed to climatic influences — he had 
never encountered a woman’s favoring smile; such, 
indeed, is the funereal destiny of many a man ; but as 
for Pons, he was a monster from his very birth ! This 
artist with the tender heart, who was so prone to reverie 
and so full of delicacy, finding himself thus doomed to 
play the part imposed upon him by his features, resigned 
all hope of ever being loved. To him celibacy was a 
matter of necessity rather than of choice. Good living. 


^^THE END OF A WINNER OF THE GRAND PRIX.’’ 27 

then — that vice of virtuous monks — held out her arms to 
him, and he rushed to her embrace with the same head- 
long alacrity that he had shown in devoting himself to 
art, and in his worship of music. What woman is to 
others, good cheer and bric-^-brac were to Pons ; for as 
to music, music was his bread-winner ; and find me, if 
you can, the man who loves the calling whereby he lives. 
In the long run ’tis with a profession as it is with 
marriage : we end by being sensible only to its draw- 
backs. 

Brillat-Savarin has deliberately vindicated the passion 
of the epicure ; but perhaps he has failed to lay suffi- 
cient stress upon the real pleasure which we experience 
at the dinner-table. Digestion, by calling into play all 
the forces of the human frame, becomes, as it were, an 
internal combat which, in the case of the gastrolater, is 
on a level with the intensest joys of love. So vast is the 
demand made upon the vital energies by the process of 
digestion, that the brain is obliterated for the benefit of 
that second brain which has its seat in the diaphragm, 
and intoxication ensues from the sheer inactivity of all 
the faculties. The boa-constrictor, for example, that 
has swallowed a bull, is so completely drunk that it will 
passively allow itself to be killed ; and where is the man 
past forty who dares to work after dinner ? Accordingly, 
all great men have been abstemious. Invalids in a state 
of convalescence after a severe illness, to whom we are 
obliged to administer niggardly rations of carefully 
selected food, must have frequently experienced the 
species of stomach-drunkenness that a single chicken’s 
wing will produce. The prudent Pons, whose sole sen- 
sual delight was centered in the play of the gastric 
juices, was habitually in the condition of these conva- 
lescent invalids, He exacted from good cheer all the 


28 


‘‘the pair of nut-crackers.” 

sensations that it can bestow ; and, up to the date of 
which we are speaking, he had enjoyed them every day. 
But no one can bid farewell to a habit. Many a suicide 
has paused on the very threshold of death, at the 
thought of the caf^ to which he resorts for his nightly 
game of dominoes. 


CHAPTER III. 

“ THE PAIR OF NUT-CRACKERS.” 

In 1835 chance compensated Pons for the indifference 
of the fair sex by furnishing him with what, in col- 
loquial phraseology, is termed “ an old man’s walking- 
stick.” In that year this old fellow — who had been born 
old — found in friendship a staff of life, and contracted 
a matrimonial alliance qf that sort from which, and from 
which alone, social arrangements did not exclude him ; 
he married an old man who, like Pons himself, was a 
musician. But for the existence of La Fontaine’s divine 
fable, this sketch would have been entitled “The Two 
Friends.” So to have entitled it, however, would have 
amounted to a literary crime — to a sacrilege from which 
every genuine man of letters must needs recoil. The 
masterpiece of our French .^Esop — a masterpiece which 
is at once the outpouring of his heart and the story of 
his dreams, deserves the exclusive right of bearing that 
title forever. Yes, the page on which the poet has 
engraved these three words, “ The Two Friends,” is one 
of those inviolable domains — a temple, as it were — which 


29 


“the pair of nut-crackers.” 

generation after generation will enter with respect, and 
the whole world will visit as long as typography endures. 

Pons’ friend was a pianoforte teacher. His mode of 
life and his habits chimed in with those of Pons so well 
that the latter used to say that, unfortunately for his 
happiness, he had met his friend too late ; for their 
acquaintanceship, which had been struck up at a prize- 
distribution in some young ladies’ school, did not date 
further back than the year 1834. Never, perhaps, had 
two such congenial spirits met upon the wide ocean of 
humanity — that ocean whose earliest waters welled up 
in the terrestrial paradise, in opposition to the will of 
God. In a very short time the two musicians became 
indispensable one to the other. In the space of eight 
days, mutual confidences made them, as it were, a pair 
of brothers — in short, previously to this time Schmucke 
no more believed in the existence of such a person as 
Schmucke than Schmucke believed in the existence of 
such a person as Pons. 

We have already said enough to describe these two 
worthies ; but since there are intellects that have no 
taste for synthetical conciseness, a brief demonstration 
is necessary to convince the unbelieving. 

This pianist, then, like every other pianist, was a Ger- 
man ; just as the great Listz and the great Mendelssohn 
are Germans; just as Steibelt, Mozart and Dusseck, 
Meyer, Doelher, Thalberg, Hiller, Leopold Mayer, 
Crammer, Zimmerman, and Kalkbrenner are Germans ; 
just as Hertz, Woetz, Karr, Wolff, Pixis, Clara Wieck, 
and — to be more specific — just as all Germans are Ger- 
mans. Now, although Schmucke was a great composer, 
he could not rise above the rank of a teacher of music ; 
for the audacity necessary to a man of genius who 
would make his mark was entirely foreign to Schmucke’s 


30 


‘^THE PAIR OF NUT-CRACKERS.” 

disposition. The simplicity which characterizes many 
Germans is not continuous ; it is intermittent. When 
they have reached a certain age, the naivete they then 
exhibit is drawm from the sources that supplied their 
youth (much as water is supplied to a canal), and is 
employed to irrigate their successes, artistic, scientific 
or pecuniary — in fact, they use it as a shield to protect 
them from suspicion. In France, certain cunning folks 
adopt the stupidity of the Parisian grocer as a substi- 
tute for this German simplicity. But as for Schmucke, 
he had really retained all the artlessness of his child- 
hood, just as Pons retained, in his attire, the relics of the 
imperial epoch — that is to say, quite unconsciously. 

This true and noble German was performer and 
audience, both in one. He played to and for himself. 
He lived in Paris just as a nightingale dwells in its 
forest ; and for a space of twenty years sung on — sole 
member of his tribe — until the moment when he 
encountered Pons and found in him a second self. (See 
“Une Fille d’Eve.”) 

Pons and Schmucke had a copious and an equal store 
of that childish sentimentality which distinguishes the 
Germans. They both had a passion for flowers ; they 
both felt for natural scenery that admiration which 
induces the children of the Fatherland to plant their 
gardens with big bottles, to reflect, in miniature, the 
landscape which lies as large as life under their very 
eyes. Both Schmucke and Pons had that propensity for 
investigation which leads the German savafit to under- 
take — in his gaiters ! — a journey of a hundred leagues in 
order to verify a fact that stares him in the face, from 
the margin of the well beneath the court-yard jasmine. 
And lastly, both of them exhibited that passion for 
attaching a psychical significance to the veriest trifles 


31 


‘‘ THE PAIR OF NUT-CRACKERS.^’ 

in creation which gives birth to the inexplicable works 
of John Paul Richter, the drunken revels that Hoffman 
has committed to print, and the folio fences with which 
a German will encumber the very simplest questions, 
delving down into the profoundest depths, at the bottom 
of which all that we can discover is — a German ! 

Pons and Schmucke were both good Catholics ; they 
accompanied each other to mass regularly, and went 
through the routine of their religious duties like a 
couple of children who never had to unburden their 
consciences to their confessor. They implicitly believed 
that music — the language of heaven — bore to ideas and 
sentiments the same relation that ideas and sentiments 
bear to ordinary speech ; and interminable were the 
conversations which, putting their theory into practice, 
the two old men held with one another, talking to each 
other in amoebaean orgies of music in order, after the 
manner of lovers, to demonstrate, one to another, 
that of which they were already entirely convinced. 
Schmucke was as thoroughly absent-minded as Pons 
was observant ; if Pons was a collector, Schmucke was, 
as certainly, a dreamer; if Pons rescued beautiful 
objects belonging to the world of matter, Schmucke 
studied the beauties that belong to the world of mind. 
Pons would have espied and purchased a porcelain cup 
ere Schmucke, musing on some strain from Rossini, 
Bellini, Beethoven, or Mozart, and ransacking the world 
of sentiment for the origin or the counterpart of the 
musical phrase that was running in his head, had got 
through the operation of blowing his nose. But 
Schmucke, the thrifty dreamer, whose savings were at 
the mercy of his mental distraction, and Pons, whose 
passion made him prodigal, were both landed in the 
same predicament, on the thirty-first of December. St. 


32 


THE PAIR OF NUT-CRACKERS.’’ 

Sylvester’s-day in each revolving year always surprised 
them both with empty purses. 

It is possible that, but for this friendship, Pons would 
have succumbed to his afflictions ; but so soon as he 
found a heart into which he could pour his sorrows, life 
became endurable to him. The first time that he 
breathed his troubles into Schmucke’s ear, the worthy 
German advised him to live, as he himself lived, on 
bread and cheese at home, rather than go out and eat 
dinners which cost him so dear ! Alas ! Pons did not 
venture to confess to Schmucke that, in his organism, 
heart and stomach were at war ; that his stomach readily 
tolerated that which tortured his heart ; and that, cost 
what it might, he must have a good dinner to relish, 
just as a man of gallantry must have a mistress to tor- 
ment. It took Schmucke some time to gain a thorough 
knowledge of Pons’ character ; for Schmucke was too 
intensely German to possess that rapidity of observation 
which stamps the Frenchman ; but when, at length, 
Schmucke did understand his friend, he loved the poor 
fellow all the more on account of his failing — in fact, 

^ there is no stronger bond of friendship than for one of 
two friends to believe himself superior to the other. ^ 
Not even an angel could have breathed a word of dis- 
approbation at the sight of Schmucke rubbing his hands 
when he discovered how firm a hold the love of good 
living had gained upon his friend Pons. In fact, on the 
very next morning after this discovery, the worthy Ger- 
man added to the ordinary breakfast sundry dainties, 
which he himself had brought in, and continued to pro- 
vide his friend with fresh ones every ; for, since 
Pons and Schmucke had foregathered, they breakfasted 
together in their own lodgings. 

To suppose that the two friends had escaped that 



MADAME VIVET.— Page 45 . 






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33 


“ the pair op nut-orackers.’’ 

Parisian ridicule which never yet spared anything or 
anybody would argue a complete ignorance of Paris. 
Schmucke and Pons, in uniting their riches and their 
poverty, had conceived the economical idea of living 
together ; and each paid a moiety of the rent of a set of 
apartments which were very unequally divided between 
them. Their rooms formed a part of a quiet house in 
the Rue de Normandie, in the Marais. As they 
often went out together, and strolled side by side along 
the same boulevards, the idlers of the quarter had nick- 
named them “The Pair of Nut-Crackers.” This soubri- 
quet renders it superfluous to paint the portrait of 
Schmucke here ; he was to Pons what the Nurse of 
Niobe (the celebrated statue in the Vatican) is to the 
Venus of the Tribune. 

Madame Cibot, the portress of this house, was the 
pivot of “ The Pair of Nut-Crackers but so important 
is the part she plays in the drama which terminated in 
the dissolution of this twin existence, that it is better to 
reserve her portrait till the moment w^hen she enters on 
the scene. 

That which remains to be said about the moral nature 
of these two beings, is of a character less readily to be 
comprehended than anything which has gone before, by ' 
ninety-nine out of a. hundred readers, in the forty-ninth 
year of this nineteenth century. This comparative 
incomprehensibility may be attributed to the prodigious 
development of the financial element in human nature — 
a development due to the introduction of railways. 
Now, what remains to be said is but little ; yet is it 
highly important. In fact, the problem is, to convey to 
the mind of the reader an adequate idea of the extreme 
sensitiveness of these two hearts ; and here let us bor- 
row an illustration from the railways — were it only by 


^^THE EAIE OF NUT-CKACKEJis/’ 

way of recouping the capital which they are constantly 
borrowing from us. 

The trains which w'e are now accustomed to see, 
speeding along their iron roads, grind to powder, in 
their progress, minute particles of gravel. Now let such 
a minute particle — a particle too minute for a passenger 
to see — be introduced into his renal system, and he will 
experience the pangs of that most frightful malady, the 
gravel, which is often fatal. Now, that identical particle 
which, to our existing body social, traveling along its 
metallic path, with all the rapidity of a locomotive, is 
nothing more than a mere imperceptible atom of gravel, 
causing no appreciable annoyance, generated in Pons 
and Schmucke, who were incessantly exposed to its 
irritating influence, a kind of gravel of the heart. Sen- 
sitive in the extreme to the sufferings of others, each of 
these two poor creatures wept over his inability to aid ; 
while, in regard to his own feelings, each of them was 
acutely, almost morbidly susceptible. Neither old age, 
nor the continual spectacles presented by the drama of 
Parisian life — in short, nothing, had had power to 
harden these two pure, fresh and childlike hearts. The 
longer they lived, the more keen became their personal 
sufferings. Thus it is (alas that thus it should be !) with 
uncorrupted natures, with tranquil, thinkers, and with 
genuine poets, who have held themselves aloof from 
all excess. 

Since the time when these two old men had set up 
their tents together, they had imported into their occu- 
pations (which were almost identical) the harmony of 
movement that marks the paces of a pair of Parisian 
hacks. Winter and summer, Pons and Schmucke rose 
at seven o’clock, and, breakfast over, sallied forth to give 
the usual lessons in the schools which they served, where 


“ THE PAIR OF XUr-CRACKERS.’’ 35 

they supplied each other’s place, in case of need. 
Toward noon, if his presence were required at a re- 
hearsal, Pons would wend his way to Ms theater ; but all 
his leisure moments were devoted to fldnerie. Then, in 
the evening, the two friends would meet at the theater, 
where Pons had found a berth for Schmucke, after this 
wise : 

When Pons and Schmucke first met each other, Pons 
had just obtained, without even asking for it, that field- 
marshal’s bdton of obscure composers — a conductor’s 
wand. It had been conferred upon the poor musician 
through the influence of Count Popinot — then a minister 
— at the time when that bourgeois hero of the Revolution 
of July procured a theatrical license for one of those 
friends, the sight of whom brings a blush to the cheek 
of the successful adventurer, when, as he rolls along in 
his carriage, he espies some companion of his youth, a 
poor pedestrian, strapless and down at heel, clad in a 
coat of problematical hue, and embarked in speculations 
altogether too vast for his diminished capital. This 
friend of Count Popinot’s, a quondam commercial trav- 
eler, had, in by-gone days, rendered important services 
to the celebrated firm of Popinot ; and Anselm Popinot, 
who, after being twice a minister, was now a count and 
a peer of France, not only acknowledged the Illustrious 
Gaudissard, but, better still, resolved to place the 
former bagman in a position to renew his wardrobe and 
replenish his purse ; for the heart of the whilom drug- 
gist had not been corrupted, either by political life or 
the vanities of the court of the Citizen King. Gaudis- 
sard, who was still, as of yore, devoted to the ladies, 
asked that the license of a theater, then in a state of 
insolvency, might be transferred to him ; and the minis- 
ter, while acceding to his request, took care to send him 


36 


THE PAIR OF NUT-ORACKEES. 


6 ( 


J? 


certain aged admirers of the fair sex, wealthy enough to 
form a body of substantial sleeping partners, with a pas- 
sion for feminine attractions. The name of Pons, who 
was a constant guest at the Hotel Popinot, was inserted 
in the license ; and when, in the year 1834, the associa- 
tion, of which Gaudissard was the leading member, and 
which, by the way, made a fortune, embraced the notion 
of realizing, upon the boulevard, that grand idea, an 
opera for the people, it was found that the ballet-music 
and the incidental music of the fairy pieces required a 
tolerable conductor, endowed with some slight talent as 
a composer : so Pons became the leader of the orches- 
tra. Now the management which preceded the Gaudis- 
sard partnership had been too long in a state of bank- 
ruptcy to boast a copyist. So Pons introduced 
Schmucke to the theater, in the capacity of superintend- 
ent of the scores — an obscure post, which demands, how- 
ever, a sound knowledge of music. Acting on the advice 
of Pons, Schmucke concluded, with the chief of the cor- 
responding department at the Opera-Comique, an 
arrangement whereby the old German escaped the 
purely mechanical part of the work. 

Wonderful were the results produced by the co-oper- 
ation of Schmucke and Pons. Schmucke, whose strong 
point, like that of all Germans, was harmony^ looked 
after the instrumentation of the pieces, to which Pons 
supplied the airs. Yet, though the fresh, unhackneyed 
beauty of certain morceaux^ which served as an accom- 
paniment to two or three successful plays, made a forci- 
ble impression on the connoisseurs, the word progress 
furnished a sufficient explanation of the phenomenon ; 
they never inquired the names of the composers ; so 
Pons and Schmucke were merged in glory, just as some 
persons are drowned in their ovvn baths, Now at Paris, 


THE PAIR OF NUT'ORAOKERS.” 


3 T 


especially since 1830, no one can succeed without elbow- 
ing quibuscunque viis, and with/ho gentle violence, a most 
formidable cohort of competitors ; no ordinary strength 
of loin will serve your turn ; and as for our two friends, 
they were suffering from that gravel of the heart which 
clogs all ambitious efforts. 

As a general rule, Pons did not make his appearance 
in the orchestra of his theater till about eight o’clock — 
the hour at which the pieces that draw commence, and 
demand the despotic rule of the bdton for their overtures 
and incidental music. This indulgence exists in most 
of the minor theaters ; but Pons’ disinterestedness, in 
all his dealings with the managers, was such, that he 
could well afford to take matters easily. Schmucke, 
moreover, was always ready, in any emergency, to take 
the place of Pons. 

As time rolled on, Schmucke’s position in the orches- 
tra had gained stability. The Illustrious Gaudissard 
had tacitly recognized the usefulness of Pons’ collabora- 
tor ; and since a piano had now become a sine qud non in 
the orchestra of a theater of any pretensions, a piano 
was introduced and placed near to the conductor’s desk ; 
in that spot Schmucke — a spontaneous supernumerary 
— installed himself, and played the ftstrument gratis. 
When once the character of this unambitious and 
unassuming old German was known, all the musicians 
accepted him without a murmur ; and thereupon the 
manager gave Schmucke a small salary for presiding 
over those instruments, which, though often necessary, 
are not to be found in the orchestras of the boulevard 
theaters — such instruments, for example, as the piano, 
the viola, the English horn, the violoncello, the harp, 
the Spanish castanets, the bells, and the various inven- 
tions of Sax, etc, ; for if the Germans do not understand 


38 


THE PAIR OF NUT-CRACKERS.” 

how to play upon the grand instruments of Liberty, it 
cannot be denied that they have a natural aptitude for 
playing on every possible instrument of music. 

The two old artists, who were very much beloved at 
the theater, led a philosophical existence there. They 
wore scales upon their eyes, in order that they might be 
blind to all those ugly blots that uiust disfigure a theatri- 
cal troupe which includes a corps de ballet among its 
members — a frightful combination, born of the exigen- 
cies of the treasury, to be the plague of managers, 
authors and musicians alike. The high respect which 
the worthy and retiring Pons entertained both for him- 
self and for others, had won him the esteem of all with 
whom he came into contact ; and indeed it is true that, 
in every sphere of society, a life of purity and stainless 
honesty extorts admiration, even from the most corrupt ; 
and that at Paris a fine example of virtue meets with 
the same success as a big diamond or a rare curiosity. 

Not an actor, not an author, no, not the most unblush- 
ing of the ladies of the ballet, would have even dreamed 
of hoaxing or playing any practical joke upon Pons or 
Pons’ friend. - As for Pons, he would occasionally stroll 
into the green-room of the theater ; but Schmucke’s 
knowledge of tl# building was confined to the under- 
ground passages that led from the exterior of the house 
to the orchestra. When the worthy old German was on 
duty he would sometimes cast a venturesome glance at 
the body of the house, and address a question or two to 
the first flute (a young man who had been born at Stras- 
bourg, the scion of a German family from Kehl.) 
Schmucke’s question would have reference to those 
eccentric personages who are, almost invariably, to be 
seen in the stage-boxes. Little by little the child-like 
mind of Schmucke (whose education in things social was 


39 


THE PAIR OF NUT-ORAOKEKS.” 

undertaken by this flutist) was induced to admit that 
the existence of the lorette was not entirely a fable, that 
there were such things as illicit marriages, that first 
ladies of the ballet might be recklessly extravagant, and 
that box-keepers did occasionally carry on a little con- 
traband commerce. To this worthy old man, the very 
innocencies of vice seemed to be the ne plus ultra of 
Babylonian depravity ; and he greeted their rehearsal 
with a smile, such as he would have accorded to a 
Chinese arabesque. The intelligent reader will not need 
to be informed that Pons and Schmucke were both — to 
use a word that is very much in fashion — exploits ; but 
what they lost in money they gained in esteem, and in 
the good offices that were rendered to them. 

After the success of a certain ballet, which laid the 
foundation of the fortune acquired by the Gaudissard 
partnership, the managers sent Pons a silver group that 
was said to be the work of Benvenuto Cellini, and the 
price of which was so high, that it formed the topic of a 
green-room conversation. That price was no less than 
twelve hundred francs ! The poor worthy fellow wanted 
to return the gift ; and Gaudissard had a world of 
trouble in inducing him to accept it. “ Ah !” exclaimed 
Gaudissard to his partner, “ if we could but find actors 
of the same description !” This twin existence, that was 
outwardly so unruffled, was, nevertheless, troubled, but 
it was troubled solely by the vice which Pons hugged so 
tightly — his ardent passion for dining out. Accord- 
ingly, whenever Schmucke happened to be at home while 
Pons was dressing for dinner, the worthy German would 
inwardly bewail the fatal habit : “If it only made him 
vatter I” he would frequently ejaculate. And he would 
ponder over plans for curing Pons of his degrading vice ; 
for that exquisite sense of smell which distinguishes the 


40 


THE TAIK OF NUT-OKAGKEKS. 


(( 


dog belongs — in things moral — to the genuine friend ; 
he scents from afar the sorrows of his friend, divines the 
hidden sources of those sorrows, and broods over their 
remedy. 

Pons, who still retained, upon the little finger of his 
right hand, the diamond ring which, though it is now 
become ridiculous, fashion permitted the beaus of the 
Empire to wear ; Pons, in whose composition there was 
far too much of the troubadour and the Frenchman for 
his peace of mind, did not exhibit, in his countenance, 
that divine serenity which mitigated the fearful ugliness 
of Schmucke. Hence the German had gathered, irom 
the melancholy expression of his friend’s features, the 
growing difficulties that rendered his profession of 
parasite more painful from day to day. In fact, it was 
very natural that, in October, 1844, the number of 
houses in which Pons could count upon a dinner should 
be extremelv limited ; and the poor conductor, being 
now reduced to the necessity of confining his evolutions 
to the family circle, had, as we shall see, given to the 
word family far too extensive a meaning. 

The whilom prize-man was cousin-german to the first 
wife of Monsieur Camusot, the wealthy silk-mercer of 
the Rue des Bourdonnais. That lady had been a Made- 
moiselle Pons and sole heiress of one of the celebrated 
Pons Brothers, Court Embroiderers — a house in which 
the father and mother of our musician had had an 
interest. Indeed, they it was who — before the Revolu- 
tion of 1798 — had founded the business, which subse- 
quently, in 1815, was sold to Monsieur Rivet by the 
father of the first Madame Camusot. Her husband, 
who had retired from business ten years before the 
opening of this scene, was now, in 1844, a member of the 
General Council of Manufacturers, a deputy, etc., etc. 


41 


‘^THE PAIR OF NUT-OR ACKERS.” 

Pons, having acquired the friendship of the Camusot 
tribe, considered himself the cousin of the silk-mercer’s 
children by his second wife ; although, as a matter of 
fact, the poor musician was not even connected with 
them. 

The second Madame Camusot was a Mademoiselle 
Cardot. Pons, accordingly, as being a relative of the 
Camusots, introduced himself into the numerous family 
of the Cardots — another tribe of bourgeois^ which, with 
all its alliances, formed a complex society, no less 
powerful than that of the Camusots. 

Cardot, the notary, brother of the second Madame 
Camusot, had married a Mademoiselle Chiffreville 
Now, the well-known family of ChiffreVille — the queen 
of the trade in chemical products — had business rela- 
tions with the wholesale druggists, of whom Monsieur 
Anselm Popinot, who, as every one knows, was carried 
by the Revolution of July into the very innermost circle 
of dynastic politics, was the leading spirit. 

Thus our friend Pons, following in the wake of the 
Camusots and Cardots, planted himself upon the Chif- 
frevilles, and, through them, upon the Popinots ; 
always — be it understood — in his capaciti'^ of cousin to 
the cousins. 

This slight glimpse of the old man’s social relations 
— in this their final stage — will explain how it came to 
pass that, in the year 1844, he still retained a footing in 
the establishments : 

Firstly, of Monsieur le Comte Popinot, peer of France, 
ex-Minister of Agriculture and Commerce : 

Secondly, of Monsieur Cardot, ex-notary, mayor and 
deputy for one of the arrondissements of Paris : 

Thirdly, of Monsieur Camusot, senior, deputy, mem- 


- 1-2 THE PAIR OF NUT-0BA0KER8.” 

ber of the Council-General of Manufacturers, and on the 
high road to the peerage : 

Fourthly, of Monsieur Camusot, junior, son of Camu- 
sot, senior, by his first wife, and therefore the real, in 
fact the only real, cousin of Pons — even this cousin was 
a cousin once removed. 

The younger Camusot, who, to distinguish himself 
from his father and his half-brother, had added to his 
own name that of his estate (De Marville), was, in 1844 
President of one of the Divisions of the Court Royal 
of Paris. The ex-notary Cardot had married his daugh- 
ter to Berthier, his successor, and Pons, as a client of 
the office, had managed to retain a seat at this table. 
He termed it a dinner par-devant notaire. 

Such was the bourgeois firmament which Pons styled his 
family, and in which, by dint of many a painful effort, 
he had preserved the right of plying knife and fork. Of 
the ten houses which our artist frequented, the house of 
President Camusot owed him the warmest welcome ; 
for that was the object of his most assiduous attentions. 
But, unfortunately, the president’s wife, a daughter of 
the late Monsieur Thirion, groom of the chamber to 
Louis XVIII. and Charles X., had never given a cordial 
reception to her husband’s first cousin once removed. 
In his attempts to mollify this formidable relative. Pons 
had simply wasted his time ; for after giving gratuitous 
lessons to Mademoiselle Camusot, he found that he 
could not make a musician of the young lady, who, by 
the way, had a slight tendency to red hair. 

Now it was to the house of his cousin the president 
that Pons, with his hand protecting his precious 
treasure, was, at the moment when our story opens, 
wending his way. On entering the house he always 
fancied himself at the Tuileries ; so profoundly was he 


43 


“ JOYS OP" A COLLECTOR." 

impressed by the solemn green draperies, the Carmelite- 
colored hangings, the Wilton carpets and somber furni- 
ture of this abode ; in which everything exhaled an 
atmosphere of magisterial severity. Yet — strange phe- 
nomenon ! — at Popinot’s house in the Rue Basse-du- 
Rempart Pons felt quite at home, doubtlessly on 
account of the objects of art to be found there ; for 
the former minister had, since his introduction to the 
political world, imbibed the mania for collecting fine 
works of art — by way of opposition, no doubt, to the 
art of politics, which secretly collects the very foulest 
works of man. 


CHAPTER IV. 

“one of the thousand joys of a collector." 

The President de Marville lived in the Rue de Han- 
ovre, in a house that his wife had bought ten years ago, 
after the demise of both her parents, who left her their 
savings, amounting to about one hundred and fifty 
thousand francs. 

This house, whose street-front, in consequence of its 
northern aspect, is somewhat gloomy, has, at the back, a 
southern aspect that looks upon a court, beyond which 
lies a good garden. The president occupied the whole 
of the first floor, which, in the reign of Louis Quinze, 
had formed the habitation of one of the wealthiest 
financiers of the period. The second floor was let to a 
rich old lady ; and thus this abode presents the dignified 


44 


.TOYS OF A COLLECTOR.” 

and tranquil appearance that becomes the dwelling 
of a judge. 

The remnants of the magnificent estate of Marville, to 
the acquisition of which the president had devoted the 
savings of twenty years, as well as the fortune which he 
had inherited from his mother, consisted of the chateau 
itself — one of those splendid monuments which are still 
to be met with in Normandy — and a substantial farm let 
at a rental of twelve thousand francs. The chateau 
stands in a park of about two hundred and fifty acres. 
This luxury, which, in these times, may be called 
princely, costs the president three thousand francs per 
annum ; so that the estate yields a net income of nine 
thousand francs only. These nine thousand francs, 
together with the president’s salary, brought his income 
up to a total of twenty thousand francs — a sum which 
would seem to be adequate, especially when it is con- 
sidered that, as the only issue of his father’s first mar- 
riage, Monsieur de Marville would come in for one-half 
of his father’s fortune. 

But residence in Paris, and the expenses entailed on 
the president and his wife by their social position, swal- 
lowed up almost the whole of their income. Indeed, up 
to the 5"ear 1843, they had been hard pushed to make 
both ends meet. 

This inventory will show the reader why Mademoiselle 
de Marville, a young lady of twenty-three summers 
notwithstanding her portion, which amounted to 100,000 
francs, and her expectations, so frequently and skilfully 
(though fruitlessly) held forth by way of bait, still 
remained unmarried. 

For the last five years Cousin Pons had listened to the 
lamentations of Madame la Presidente, who was doomed 
to behold all the deputy judges married, and the new 


45 


‘^JOYS OF A COLLEOTOB.’^ 

judges of the tribunal made happy fathers, while she 
had been spending her time and energies in a fruitless 
attempt to dazzle with Mademoiselle de Marville’s 
expectations the unenchanted gaze of young Viscount 
Popinot, the eldest son of the prince of the drug trade, 
for whose benefit — at least so said the envious ones of 
the Rue des Lombards — quite as much as for the bene- 
fit of the younger branches of the royal family, the 
Revolution of July had been brought about. 

When Pons had reached the Rue Choiseul, and was 
just on the point of turning into the Rue de Hanovre, 
there stole over him that inexplicable sensation which 
-often besets the pure in heart, and inflicts on them tor- 
tures as keen as any that the greatest criminal can 
experience at sight of a gendarme. The question — 
“ How will the president’s wife receive me ?” — was the 
sole source of Pons’ sufferings. That fragment of gravel 
which lacerated the fibers of his heart had never worn 
itself round ; on the contrary, its angles had grown 
sharper ; and the servants of this mansion had inces- 
santly whetted the edges of the stonelet. In fact, the 
slight esteem which the Camusots entertained for Pons, 
his demonetization — so to speak — among the members 
of -this family, influenced its servants, who, without 
being positively rude to Pons, regarded him as a variety 
of the species pauper. 

His principal foe was a certain Madeleine Vivet, a 
thin and shriveled spinster, who acted as lady’s-maid to 
Madame de Marville and her daughter. This Madeleine, 
spite of her blotchy complexion — perhaps, indeed, in 
consequence of that complexion and her viperine length 
of body — had taken it into her head to become Madame 
Pons. Bux. in vain did Madeleine parade, before the 
eyes of the old bachelor, the twenty thousand francs 


JOYS OF A COLLECTOK.” 

which she had contrived to scrape together. Pons 
refused a happiness that was so deeply tinged with — 
red. So this Dido of the antechamber, who wanted to 
become the cousin of her master and mistress, played 
the poor musician many a scurvy trick. When she 
heard the worthy man upon the staircase — “ Here comes 
tlie sponger !” she would exclaim ; taking care that, if 
possible, he should overhear her. If (in the absence of 
the footman) she waited at table, she took care to give 
her victim plenty of water and very little wine ; and she 
filled his glass so full, that it was a hard matter for him 
to convey it to his lips without spilling some of its con- 
tents. Then she would forget to serve him, until the 
president's wife — in a voice that made her husband 
blush — would order her to do so ; or else she would 
upset the sauce over his clothes. In short, it was a case 
of war carried on by an inferior, certain of impunity, 
against an unfortunate superior. 

In the double capacity of housekeeper and lady’s- 
maid, Madeleine had followed the fortunes of M. and 
Mme. Camusot since their marriage. She had seen them 
in all the penury of their first start in life, at the time 
when they lived in the provinces, and M. Camusot was 
a judge of the tribunal of Alengon. She had lightened 
the burden of existence for them, when, in 1828, M. 
Camusot threw up the presidency of the tribunal of 
Mantes, and came to Paris, where he was appointed a 
jiige iT instruction. Madeleine, therefore, was far too inti- 
mately connected with the family to lack grounds for 
wreaking vengeance on it. Beneath her desire to play 
her haughty and ambitious mistress the trick of becom- 
ing her husband’s cousin, there lurked, beyond a doubt, 
one of those covert hatreds which are born of a trifle, 
small as the pebble that sets the avalanche in motion. 


47 


“.TOYS OF A COLLECTOR.’’ 

“ Here is your cousin Pons, madame, and still in that 
spencer of his. He really ought to tell me how he has 
managed to preserve it during these five-and-twenty 
years.” 

Such was Madeleine’s intimation to her mistress. 

Hearing a man’s footstep in the little room that lay 
between her drawing-room and bedchamber, Mme. Cam- 
usot looked at her daughter and shrugged her 
shoulders. 

' “You always contrive to give me warning so cleverly, 
Madeleine, as to leave me no time to determine how to 
act,” said Mme. Camusot. 

“John is out, madame ; I was alone ; and when Mon- 
sieur Pons rang the bell I opened the door to him. As 
he is almost one of the family, I could not prevent his fol- 
lowing me. He is outside now, taking off his spencer.” 

“ My poor Minette,” quoth the lady to her daughter, 
“ we are fairly caught ; now we shall have to dine at 
home.” Then seeing how utterly woe-begone her dear 
Minette appeared, she resumed : 

“ Come, shall we rid ourselves of him for good ?” 

“Oh ! poor man !” replied Mile. Camusot, “would 
you deprive him of one of his dinners ?” 

Hereupon the little anteroom resounded with the 
affected cough of a man who adopts this method of 
saying, “ I can overhear you.” 

“Well, show him in,” said Mme. Camusot, shrugging 
her shoulders. “ You have called so early, cousin,” 
said Cecile Camusot, assuming a slightly coaxing air — 
“ you have called so early that you have come upon us just 
as mamma was going to dress.” 

Cousin Pons, on whom the movement of the shoul- 
ders had not been thrown away, was so deeply wounded 
that he could find no compliment to utter, and took 


48 


“joys of a collector.” 

refuge in the profound remark: “You are as charm- 
ing as ever, little cousin." Then turning to the matron, 
and bowing, he continued: “You will bear me no 
grudge, dear cousin, for coming a little earlier than 
usual, for I have brought you what you did me the 
pleasure to ask me for." 

And poor Pons, who excruciated the president, the 
president’s wife and Cecile, every time that he called 
them “ cousin," drew from the side-pocket of his coat an 
exquisite little oblong box of Saint-Lucia wood divinely 
carved. 

“ Oh ! I had entirely forgotten all about it !" said 
Mme. Camusot, dryly. 

Now, was not this an atrocious thing to say ? Was 
not this a stealing of all merit from the pains taken by 
her relation, whose only fault was that he was a poor 
relation ? 

“ But,” pursued she, “ you are extremely kind, cousin. 
Am I much in your debt for this little bit of trumpery ?" 

This question made Pons wince internally ; he had 
looked upon this little trinket as an oblation that would 
pay for all his dinners. 

“ I thought that you would allow me to offer it to you 
as a present," said he, with emotion. 

“ What do you mean ? What do you mean ?" 
exclaimed the lady. “Come now, don’t let there beany 
ceremony between us; we know each other quite well 
enough to speak frankly to one another. I know that 
you are not rich enough to provide the sinews of war ; 
is it not sufficient that you should have incurred 
trouble and loss of time in going about from shop to 
shop ?” 

“ My dear cousin, I don’t think that you would care to 
have this fan if you were called upon to give for it what it 


49 


JOYS OF A COLLECTOR.’’ 

IS worth,” replied the poor man in his wrath, “ for it is one 
of Watteau’s masterpieces ; both of its sides were 
painted by him. But make your mind easy, cousin ; the 
fan did not cost me the hundredth part of its value as a 
work of art.” 

To say to a rich person : “You are poor,” is like tell- 
ing the Archbishop of Granada that his sermons are 
rubbish. Mme. de Marville was far too proud of her 
husband’s position, of being the owner of the estate of 
Marville, and of her invitations to the court balls, not to 
be cut to the very quick by such an observation, espe- 
cially when it emanated from a miserable musician, in 
regard to whom she assumed the part of Lady Bountiful. 

“ Then the people of whom you buy these things must 
be very stupid,” said the lady, with marked emphasis. 

“There is no such thing in all Paris as a stupid shop-, 
keeper,” replied Pons, almost dryly. 

“ It is you who are so clever, then,” said Cecile, in 
order to put an end to the discussion. 

“ I am clever enough, little cousin, to know the handi- 
work of Lancret, Pater, Watteau and Greuze ; but, 
moreover, I was stimulated by a desire to please your 
dear mamma.” 

Vain and ignorant, Mme. Camusot did not wish to 
have the appearance of receiving even a trifle from the 
hands of her parasite ; and her ignorance stood her in 
good stead ; the very name of Watteau was unknown 
to her. 

If anything can prove the enormous self-esteem of the 
collector (which assuredly takes rank with any, for it 
rivals the self-esteem of the author), ’tis the hardihood 
displayed by Pons in thus holding his own against his 
cousin for the first time in the course of twenty years. 
Amazed at his own audacity, Pons resumed a pacific 


50 


JOYS OF A COLLECTOR.” 

mien, while he pointed out to Cecile, in detail, the beau- 
ties of the delicate carving of the branches of the mar- 
velous fan. But to explain the heartfelt trepidation 
which seized upon the worthy man, we must give a 
slight sketch of Mme. la Presidente. 

At the age of forty-six, Mme. de Marville, who had 
once been fair, plump and fresh — short she always was — 
had become skinny. Her bulging forehead and retreat- 
ing mouth, having lost the delicate redeeming tints of 
youth, now gave to her face, that had always worn a 
disdainful look, an air of sullenness. Habitual and 
unresisted despotism in her own house had rendered 
her features hard and disagreeable ; while Time had 
changed her once fair hair to a harsh chestnut color. 
Her eyes, still keen and caustic, had a look of magister- 
ial arrogance, big with suppressed envy. In fact, the 
wife of the president found that, amid the circle of suc- 
cessful bourgeois with whom Pons dined, she was almost 
poor. She could not forgive the wealthy wholesale 
druggist, (the former President of the Tribunal of Com- 
merce) for having successively attained the rank of 
deputy, of minister, of count and peer. She could not 
forgive her father-in-law for having, to the detriment of 
his eldest son, procured his own nomination as deputy 
of his own arrondissement at the time when Popinot 
was raised to the peerage. She had been in Paris 
eighteen years, and was still waiting for her husband to 
be appointed Counselor of the court of Cassation, a post 
from which he was shut out on account of his limited 
capacity, which was notorious at the palace. The gen- 
tleman who in 1844 occupied the post of Minister of 
Justice regretted that Camusot had been made a presi- 
dent in 1834; but, to mitigate the evil, he had been 
relegated to the criminal department, where, thanks to 


c^.TOYS OF A COLLPXTOli. 


51 


hi^ technical training as a juge d' instruction^ he did good 
work by making short work of the accused. These 
^ various crosses had so worn and worried Mme. de 
Marville (who, by the w'ay, labored under no delusion 
with regard to her husband’s capacity) that they had 
ended by making her quite terrible. Her disposition 
which was originally overbearing, was now soured. 
Aged rather than old, she assumed all the harshness and 
dryness of a brusque, with a view to extorting, through 
the fear which she inspired, all that the world was 
inclined to withhold. Sarcastic to excess, she had few 
friends ; but she possessed a good deal of influence ; for 
she had gathered round her a circle of old female pietists, 
of her own stamp, who, with an eye to reciprocity, lent 
her their support. Thus the relations of poor Pons 
toward this devil in petticoats were exactly like those 
which exist between a pupil and a master who speaks 
only through the rod ; so that the lady was entirely at a 
loss to understand the sudden boldness of her cousin ; 
she was completely ignorant of the value of the fan. 

“ And pray where did you find this ?” inquired Cecile, 
as she examined the treasure. 

“ In the Rue de Lappe, in the sljop of a broker who 
had just brought it from a chateau near Dreux, that has 
just been pulled down. The name of the chateau is 
Aulnay ; Madame de Pompadour occasionally stayed 
there, before she built Menars. They have preserved 
some of the most splendid wood-work that was ever 
known ; 'it is so beautiful that Lienard, our celebrated 
wood-carver, has retained two oval frames for models, 
as being the ne plus ultra of the art. Ah ! there were 
treasures there, indeed ! My broker found his fan in 
an inlaid bonheur-du-jour ^ which I should have bought if 
I collected such things ; but that is far beyond my 


52 .rOYS OF A collector." 

reach ! Why, a piece of furniture by Reisener is worth 
three or four thousand francs ! In Paris people are 
beginning to understand that the famous inlayers 
(French and German) of the sixteenth, seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries, produced veritable pictures in 
wood. The merit of a collector consists in getting the 
start of fashion. Mark what I say : five years hence the 
Frankenthal porcelain, which I have been collecting for 
the last twenty years, will be twice as dear as the soft 
porcelain of Sevres.” 

“What do you mean by Frankenthal?” asked Cecile. 

“ It is the name of the china manufactory of the 
Elector Palatine ; 'tis older than our Sevres works ; just 
as the famous gardens of Heidelberg, which Turenne 
destroyed, had the misfortune to exist before the gardens 
of Versailles were laid out. Sevres has imitated Frank- 
enthal to a considerable extent. We must, in justice, 
admit that the Germans produced, in Saxony and the 
Palatinate, some admirable works, before we did.” 

Mother and daughter looked at each other as if Pons 
had been talking Chinese ; for the ignorance and nar- 
rowness of the Parisians are beyond conception. They 
learn what we try to teach them only when they want 
to be taught. 

“And how do you recognize Frankenthal porcelain ?” 

“ Why Jhe signature exclaimed Pons, with animation. 
“ All these exquisite masterpieces are signed. Frank- 
enthal china has a C and a T (Charles-Theodore) inter- 
twined, and surmounted by a prince’s coronet ; old 
Dresden has the two swords and the ordinal number in 
gold ; Vincennes used to sign with a horn ; Vienna has 
a V fermed and barred ; Berlin has the double bar ; 
Mayence the wheel ; Sevres the double LL ; while the 
queen’s porcelain has an A (which stands for Antoinette) 


THE JOYS OF A COLLEOTOK.” 


53 


surmounted by the royal crown. In the eighteenth cen- 
tury, all the sovereigns of Europe competed with one 
another in the manufacture of porcelain ; they stole each 
other’s workmen. Watteau designed services for the 
Dresden works, and his productions now command 
exorbitant prices (one needs to know them well ; for 
nowadays Dresden is reproducing and imitating them.) 
In those days some admirable things were produced, 
things the like of which will never see light again.” 

“ What nonsense !” 

‘‘Nay, cousin ; ’tis as I say. There are certain kinds 
of marquetry and porcelain that will never again be pro- 
duced, any more than the pictures of Raphael, Titian, 
Rembrandt, Van Eyck and Cranach will be reproduced. 
Why ! the Chinese are extremely skilful, extremely 
clever — are they not ? Well, they are now producing 
copies of their choicest china, that which is known as 
Grand-Mandarin ; well ! two vases of Grand-Mandarin, 
of the largest size, are worth six thousand, eight thous- 
and, nay, even ten thousand francs ! and you can get a 
modern copy for two hundred francs !” 

“ You must be joking !” 

“ Cousin, these prices astonish you ; but they are a 
mere nothing. Not only does a complete dinner service 
for twelve, made of soft Sevres ware (which is not porce- 
lain), fetch a hundred thousand francs ; but that is the 
invoice price. Such a service cost fifty thousand livres 
at Sevres in 1750. I have seen the original invoices.” 

“Let us come back to this fan,” said Cecile, in whose 
eyes the trinket had the fault of looking too old. 

‘ You see,” said Pons, “I began my hunt directly 
your dear mamma did me the honor to ask me for a fan. 
I examined all the dealers’ shops in Paris, without find- 
ing anything that was really fine ; for I wanted to give 


54 


JOYS OF A collector/’ 


Madame la Presidente a chef-d'mivre^ and I did think of 
offering her the fan of Marie Antoinette — the most beau- 
tiful of all celebrated fans ; but yesterday I was dazzled 
by this divine masterpiece, which must certainly have 
been bespoken by Louis Quinze himself. Now, why did 
I go to the Rue de Lappe, to search for a fan in the 
shop of an Auvergnat, who deals in copper, old iron and 
gilt furniture? Well, for my own part, I believe that 
works of art have minds ; that they know an amateur 
when they see him, that they beckon to him, that they 
call out to him : ‘ Hist ! hist !’ ” Here Mme. Camusot 
indulged in another shrug of the shoulders, and looked 
at her daughter ; but this rapid pantomime escaped 
Pons’ notice. 

“ I know them all, these rascals ! ‘ What novelty have 

you. Daddy Monistrol ? Have you any door-tops ?’ I 
said to this dealer, who allows me just to cast an eye 
over his purchases, before the wholesale buyers come. 
In answer to my inquiry, Monistrol told me how Lienard, 
who was doing some very fine carving for royalty, in 
the chapel of Dreux, had, at the sale of Aulnay, rescued 
the carved wood-work from the Paris dealers, who were 
on the lookout for porcelain and inlaid furniture, ‘I 
didn’t pick up much,’ replied Monistrol, ‘ but that^' said 
he, pointing to the bonheur-du-jour^ ‘ will pay the expenses 
of my journey.’ ’Tis a perfect marvel, with designs by 
Boucher, executed in marquetry most artistically ; one 
feels inclined to go down on one’s knees before it. 
‘ Look here, sir,’ says Monistrol, ‘ I have just come across 
this fan in a little drawer, which was locked, and had no 
key, so that I had to force it opeu. You might perhaps 
tell me where I can sell it.’ And so saying, forth he 
pulls this little box of carved Saint-Lucia wood. ‘ Look !’ 
says he, ‘it’s in that Pompadour style that looks like 


JOYS OF A COLLECTOR.” 55 

flowered Gothic.’ ‘ Yes,’ said I, ‘ the box is pretty ; the 
box might suit me ; for as to the fan, my worthy Monis- 
trol, I have no Mme. Pons to give the old trinket to ; 
besides, one can buy new ones that are very pretty ; they 
paint these vellums, nowadays, marvelously, and very 
cheap. Are you aware that there are two thousand 
painters in Paris ?’ And so saying I carelessly opened 
the fan, suppressing my admiration, and looking with a 
cold eye at these little pictures, the freedom and finish 
of which are exquisite. I held in my hand the fan of 
Mme. Pompadour ! — a work that had taxed the energies 
of Watteau to the very utmost ! ‘ How much do you 

want for the piece of furniture?’ I inquired. ‘Oh ! a 
thousand francs ; I have been offered that for it already.’ 
I then named, as the price of the fan, a sum proportioned 
to the probable expenses of his journey. 

“Thereupon we looked each other full in the face, and 
I saw that my man was caught. Quick as thought I 
clap the fan into the box, to prevent the Auvergnat 
from examining it, and I go into ecstasies over the 
workmanship of the box, which is certainly a perfect 
gem. ‘ If I buy the fan, ’tis only for the sake of the 
box ; it is only the box that tempts me, look you. As 
for the botiheiir-du-jour^ you will get more than a thous- 
and francs for that ; look at the chiseling of this 
copper ; what models ! You may make a good thing 
out of that ; it has never been copied ; everything that 
was made for Madame de Pompadour was unique.’ 
And my man, warming up over his boiiheur-du-jour, for- 
gets all about the fan, and allows me to have it for 
nothing, in exchange for my revelation of the beauties 
of the piece of furniture by Reisener. So there you 
are ! But it requires a lot of practice to be able to 
drive such bargains. It is a struggle of eye against 


56 “joys of a collector.” 

eye ; and what an eye is the eye of a Jew or an Au- 
vergnat !” 

The wonderful acting, the animation of the old mati, 
as he narrated the triumph of his subtilty over the 
ignorance of the broker, formed a subject fit for the 
brush of a Dutch artist. But it was all thrown away 
upon Mme. Camusot and her daughter, who, while they 
exchanged glances that betokened indifference and dis- 
dain, mentally exclaimed : “ What an original !” 

“And that sort of thing amuses you?” asked the 
president’s wife. 

This question froze poor Pons ; he felt inclined to 
strike the woman. 

“Why, my dear cousin,” replied he, “it is a master- 
piece-hunt — a hunt in the course of which you find 
yourself confronted by adversaries who defend the 
game ! ’Tis a case of ruse against ruse ! A master- 
piece defended by a Norman, an Auvergnat, or a Jew ! — 
why ’tis like the fairy tales in which you find a princess 
guarded by enchanters !” 

“ And how do you know that this fan is by Watt — 
what d’ye call him ?” 

“ Watteau, dear cousin ; one of the greatest of French 
painters in the eighteenth century ! Look here — don’t 
you perceive the signature?” said Pons, pointing to 
one of the principal scenes, representing a round, danced 
by great ladies disguised as peasant girls, and by grand 
gentlemen in the garb of shepherds. “How seductive ! 
What warmth ! What coloring ! And ’tis all executed 
at a single stroke, like a writing-master’s flourish. 
There is not a trace of effort in it ! And see, on the 
other side, you have a ball in a drawing-room ! What 
decorations ! And then, how well it is preserved ! You 


JOYS OF A OOLLEOTOk/’ .">7 

see the ferule is of gold, and is finished off on either 
side with a little ruby, which I have polished !” 

“ That being so, cousin, I cannot accept from you so 
valuable a present. You had better sell the fan, and 
invest the proceeds,” said Mme. Camusot, though she 
was longing to keep the magnificent fan. 

“ It is high time,” said the worthy man, recovering all 
his self-possession, “ that that which has been in the 
service of Vice should be placed in the hands of Virtue. 
It will have taken a century to work that miracle. You 
may rely on this, that no princess at court will have 
anything that can compare with this masterpiece ; for, 
unfortunately, it is characteristic of human nature to do 
more for a Pompadour than for a virtuous queen.” 

“ Very well ; I accept the fan,” said Mme. Camusot, 
smiling. “ Cecile, my little angel, go and help Made- 
leine to see that the dinner is worthy of our cousin.” 

The president’s wife wished to square accounts with 
Pons ; and this direction, which, in violation of all the 
dictates of good taste, was uttered aloud, looked so like 
the discharging of a debt that poor Pons blushed like a 
young girl caught tripping. It was some time ere this 
pebble, of abnormal size, ceased to rattle in the old 
man's heart. 

Cecile, meanwhile, a young lady with a decided ten- 
dency to red hair, and whose somewhat formal manner 
recalled her father’s judicial gravity, and had a touch of 
her mother’s dryness, now disappeared, leaving poor 
Pons alone, to tackle the terrible Mme. Camusot. 


58 


‘^AFFliONT.S TO A TAKASITK.” 


CHAPTER V. 

“ ONE OF THE THOUSAND AFFRONTS THAT A PARASITE 
HAS TO PUT UP WITH.” 

My little Lili is very pleasing,” said Mme. Camusot, 
still using the childish abbreviation that had formerly 
been applied to Cecile’s name. . 

“Charming,” replied the musician, twiddling his 
thumbs. 

“ I can’t understand the times we live in at all,” pur- 
sued the lady. “What is the use of having a president 
of the Court Royal of Paris, a commander of the Legion 
of Honor, for your father, and for your grandfather a 
millionaire deputy, who is sure some day to be a peer 
of France, and is at the head of the wholesale silk trade, 
I should very much like to know ?” 

The zeal of the president on behalf of the new dynasty 
had recently procured him a commander’s ribbon — a 
favor which certain envious persons ascribed to the 
friendship that existed between him and Popinot. 

Tjtiat minister, notwithstanding his modesty, had, as 
we have seen, allowed himself to be made a count — 
“ For my son’s sake ” — said he to his numerous friends. 

“ In these days,” replied Pons, “ the one thing need- 
ful is — money. 'Tis only the rich who are respected 
and—” ^ ^ 

“ How would it have been then if Heaven had spared 
my poor little Charles ?” 

“ Oh ! with two children, you would be poor !” re- 
plied the cousin. “That is the result of the equal divi- 


59 


“affronts to a parasite.” 

sion of property ; but make your mind easy ; Cecile 
will make a good match, after all. I know of no young 
lady so highly accomplished.” 

You see to what a degree Pons had learned to degrade 
his intellect, when he was beneath the roof of his Am- 
phitryons. When there he echoed their ideas, with 
vapid comments of his own, like the chorus in a Greek 
play. He did not dare to give rein to that originality 
which is characteristic of the artist, and which had, in 
his youth, flowed freely from his lips, in subtle strokes 
of wit, though it was now well-nigh extinguished, 
through his habitual self-effacement, and was checked, 
whenever it appeared, as in the scene which we have 
just described. 

“ But though my dowry was only twenty thousand 
francs / found a husband — ” 

“In the year 1819, cousin,” interrupted Pons, “and 
then it was you^ a vvoman of intellect, a young lady 
patronized by Louis XVIII. !” 

“ But still my daughter is a perfect angel, and a girl 
of talent ; she is full of heart, and she has a marriage 
portion of a hundred thousand franc-s, to say nothing 
of her large expectations ; yet she remains upon 
our hands — ” 

Mme. de Marville went on talking about her daughter 
and herself for twenty minutes ; abandoning herself to 
the lamentations peculiar to mothers who are “under 
the dominion” of daughters in want of a husband. 
Throughout the period of twenty years, during which 
the old musician had been in the habit of dining from 
time to time at the house of Camusot, his only cousin, 
he had waited — and waited in vain — to hear a single 
syllable about his own affairs, his mode of life, his 
health. Nor was this all. Wherever he went he was 


60 ‘‘affeonts to a pakasite.” 

used as a kind of conduit-pipe for domestic confidences ; 
his reticence being guaranteed by his well-known discre- 
tion — an enforced discretion, for a single bold word 
would h^ve closed the doors of ten houses against him 
forever. His part of listener, therefore, was backed up 
by unwavering acquiescence ; he greeted every state- 
ment with a smile ; he never attacked, he never 
defended, any one. With him, every one was in the 
right. Accordingly, he had ceased to be reckoned as a 
man ; he was — a stomach ! 

In the course of her long tirade the wife of the presi- 
dent acknowledged to her cousin, with due precaution, 
that she was inclined to accept, almost without inquiry, 
any suitor who might seek her daughter’s hand. She 
even went so far as to treat a man of forty-eight as an 
eligible husband, provided only that he had an income 
of twenty thousand francs. 

“Cecile,” she said, “is in her twenty-third year, and 
should she be so unlucky as to remain single until she 
is twenty-five or twenty-six, it would be no easy matter 
to get her married. In such a case people will ask them- 
selves how it is that a young woman has remained upon 
the shelf so long. Indeed there is already a great deal 
too much talk in our circle about Cecile’s position ; we 
have exhausted all the ordinary excuses, such as, ‘She is 
verjf young,’ ‘She is perfectly happy at home,’ ‘She is 
hard to please, she wants to marry a man of family.’ 
People are beginning to laugh at us, I feel sure of it. 
Besides, Cecile is tired of waiting ; she suffers, poor 
little—” 

“ Suffers ! In what way ?” asked Pons, stupidly. 

“Why,” replied her mother, in the tones of a duenna, 
“she feels mortified at seeing all her companions mar- 
ried before her,” 


‘‘AFFRONTS TO A PARASITE.” 


61 


“ But what has happened, cousin, since the last time I 
had the pleasure of dining here, that you should be 
thinking of men of forty-eight ?’* humbly inquired the 
poor musician. 

“Why, this has happened,” said Mme. de Marville. 
“We were to have had an interview with a counselor of 
the court, who has a son aged thirty, and whose fortune 
is considerable. Monsieur de Marville would, by sacri- 
ficing a certain sum, have procured for the son the post 
of referendary at the Court of Accounts, where he is 
already employed as a supernumerary ; when, lo and 
behold ! they come and tell us that the young fellow 
has been mad enough to rush off to Italy, on the track 
of a duchess from Mabille. It is merely a refusal in 
disguise. They think that a young man, who, in conse- 
quence of the death of his mother, is in the present 
enjoyment of an income of thirty thousand francs, is too 
good for us. So you must pardon us our bad temper, 
cousin ; you came upon us in the midst of the crisis.” 

While Pons was cudgeling his brains for one of those 
complimentary rejoinders which always came to him too 
late, when he was in the presence of an Amphitryon 
whom he feared, in came Madeleine, who handed Mme. 
Camusot a little note, and stood waiting for the answer. 
The billet ran as follows : 

“ How would it be, dear mamma, if we were to pretend that 
this little note has been sent to us from the Palace of Justice by 
my father, directing you to take me with you to dine at his friend’s, 
with a view to renewing the negotiations for my marriage? 
Cousin Pons would then go away and leave us at liberty to prose- 
cute our plans with reference to the Popinots.'* 

“ By whom did your master send this note ?” asked 
the president’s wife, emphatically. 


0)2 


‘‘aFFKONTS to a rAKASITE.*’ 

By one of the palace attendants,” replied Madeleine, 
the lean, unblushingly. 

By this answer to her mistress’ question the old 
waiting-woman intimated that she had helped the dis- 
concerted damsel to hatch this little plot. 

“Say that my daughter and I will be there at half- 
past five.” 

So soon as Madeleine had left the room Mme. 
Camusot turned to Pons with that look of mock amenity 
which excites, in a sensitive mind, a sensation akin to 
that produced by a mixture of vinegar and milk upon 
the palate of an epicure, and said : 

“My dear cousin, dinner has been ordered ; but you 
must eat it without our company ; for my husband 
writes to inform me that the marriage scheme is on foot 
again, and that we are to dine with the counselor. You 
know well that you and I don’t stand upon ceremony 
with one another. Make yourself perfectly at home 
here. (You see how frank I am with you^ from whom I 
have no secrets.) I am sure you would not like to be 
the cause of my little angel’s marriage being frustrated, 
would you ?” 

“/, cousin, I; who, on the contrary, would like to 
find a husband for her ; but in the sphere in which 
I move — ” 

“Your chances are certainly very slight,” chimed in 
Mme. Camusot, insolently. “So you will stay, won’t 
you? Cecile will keep you company while I am 
dressing.” 

“Oh! cousin, I can dine elsewhere,” said the good 
fellow ; for though great was the pain he felt at the 
manner in which the lady taxed him with his indigence, 
his horror at the prospect of being left to the tender 
mercies of the servants was greater still. 


AFFliONTS TO A PARASITE." 

But why dine elsewhere ? Dinner is ready ; the ser- 
vants would eat it if you didn’t.” 

When Pons heard this terrific phrase, he jumped up 
as if he had received the discharge of a galvanic battery, 
bowed distantly to his cousin, and went in search of his 
spencer. The door of Cecile’s bedroom, which opened 
into the little anteroom, stood ajar ; so that Pons, 
glancing at the mirror in front of him, saw the young 
lady shaking her sides with laughter and communi- 
cating with her mother by means of nods and gestures 
which plainly showed the old musician that he was the 
victim of some unworthy hoax. Restraining his tears, 
he slowly descended the staircase, knowing that he had 
received his dismissal from that house, though ignorant 
wdiy he had received it. “I am too old now,” said he to 
himself. “The world hates old age and poverty — two 
ugly things. In future I will go nowhere without an 
invitation.” Heroic phrase ! 

The door of the kitchen, which was upon the ground- 
floor opposite to the porter’s lodge, was frequently left 
open ; as it often is in those houses which are occupied 
by their owners, and of which the carriage-gates are 
always shut. So poor Pons could hear the laughter of 
the cook and of the footman, to whom Madeleine w'as 
retailing the trick that had been played upon Pons — for 
she did not suppose he would evacuate the place so 
promptly. The footman, for his part, highly approved 
of the joke that had been perpetrated at the expense 
of the constant visitor, who, as the footman said, 
never gave him more than half a crown by way of 
Christmas-box !” 

“ Yes ; but still, if he takes the hump and don’t come 
back any more, it will be three francs out of our pockets 
on New-Year’s-day,” remarked the cook. 


AJb'FROJSTS TO A PARASITE. 


CA 


“And pray how is he to know anything about it?” 
said the footman, in answer to the cook. 

“ Bah !” said Madeleine. “ A little sooner or a little 
later, what does it matter to us ? The folks at whose 
houses he dines are so heartily sick of him that he’ll 
soon be sent about his business by them one and all.” 

Just at this moment the voice of the old musician was 
heard calling to the portress. “The string, if you 
please.” This doleful cry was received in the kitchen 
with the deepest silence. 

“ He was listening,” said the footman. 

“ Well, so much the worser, or rather so much the 
better,” retorted Madeleine. “ He’s a regular scum.” 

The poor man — whom not a word of what passed in 
the kitchen had escaped — overheard this last phrase 
also ; and proceeded homeward in a state closely resem- 
bling that of an old woman after a desperate struggle 
.with a murderer. Muttering to himself, he hastened 
onward with convulsive speed ; for wounded honor 
hurried him along like a straw driven before a hurri- 
cane, until at five o’clock he found himself upon the 
Boulevard du Temple without in the least knowing how 
he got there ; yet, strange to say, he did not feel in the 
slightest 'degree hungry. But in order that the reader 
may understand the revolution in Pons’ domestic 
arrangements that his return home at this unwonted 
hour was about to produce, the promised information 
about Mme. Cibot must here be given. 



JHADAME CIBOT LEANING PROUDLY ON THE HANDLE OF HER BROOM.— iSce Page 67 





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65 


“ SPECIMEN OF THE PORTEK.” 


CHAPTER VI. 

“specimen of the porter (male and female).” 

The Rue de Normandie is one of those streets in the 
midst of which a man may easily fancy himself in the 
country. It is a street in which the grass grows luxu- 
riantly, in which a passenger creates a sensation, and 
the inhabitants of which all know each other. The 
houses in it were built in the reign of Henri Quatre, at 
a time when it was intended to build a quarter, each 
of whose streets should bear the name of a province, 
and in the center of which there was to be a grand 
square dedicated to France. The idea of the Quartier 
de I’Europe was a plagiary of this scheme ; for the 
world is perpetually repeating itself in all places and in 
all things — even in matters of speculation. 

The house in which the two musicians dwelt was 
originally an old mansion with a court in front of it and 
a garden in the rear ; but a street fagade was added to 
it during that part of the last century when the Marais 
was in so much vogue. The two friends occupied the 
whole of the second floor of the original mansion. 

This double house belonged to a M. Pillerault, an 
octogenarian, who left the management of it entirely in 
the hands of M. and Mme. Cibot who had acted as his 
door-keepers for six-and-twenty years. Now, since the 
emoluments of a porter in the Marais are not sufficient 
to enable him to live upon them alone, M. Cibot to his 
perquisites — the sou in the livre and the fagot in the 
load — added the produce of his personal industry ; he 


G6 


SPECIMEN OF THE PORTER.'’ 


was what many a porter is — a tailor. As time rolled on 
Cibot gave up working as a journeyman ; for, in conse- 
quence of the confidence reposed in him by the small 
shop-keepers in the neighborhood, he acquired the 
exclusive privilege of patching, renovating and fine- 
drawing all coats to be found within a perimeter of 
three streets. His lodge was large and healthy, having 
a bedroom annexed to it ; so that the Cibot household 
was regarded by all the gentlemen who exercised the 
functions of porter in the neighborhood as one of the 
most highly favored establishments of its kind. 

Cibot was a short, stunted little man, who, by dint of 
sitting day after day with his legs crossed Turk-wise 
beneath him upon a table that was exactly on a level 
with the grated window that looked upon the street, 
had acquired a complexion that was almost olive- 
colored. His trade brought him in about two shillings 
a day, and he still pursued it in spite of his fifty-eight 
years ; but then fifty-eight is the prime of life for a por- 
ter ; when he has reached that age his lodge has become 
to him what the shell is to the oyster, and moreover — he 
is known in the district ! 

Mme. Cibot, who had once been famous as the pretty 
oyster-girl of the Cadran-Bleu, had quitted her post in 
that establishment for the sake of Cibot when she had 
attained the age of twenty-eight, and had run the 
gantlet of all those adventures which a pretty oyster- 
girl encounters without the trouble of seeking them. 
The beauty of women belonging to the lower classes 
is short-lived ; especially when they are posted, like an 
espalier-tree, at the d^r of a restaurant, where their 
features grow coarse through exposure to the heat-rays 
of the kitchen, and their skin is interpenetrated by the 
contents of many a half-emptied wine-bottle, shared 


67 


^‘specimen of the porter.’^ 

with the waiters of the establishment ; in fact, no flower 
matures more rapidly than that of a pretty oyster-girl. 

Fortunately for Mme. Cibot, marriage and the life of a 
portress came to her in time to preserve her charms ; 
and accordingly a perfect model for Rubens, she 
retained a masculine style of beauty which her rivals of 
the Rue de Normandie sought to disparage, calling her 
“ a great fat lollop.” The tones of her skin might be 
compared to the appetizing glaze upon lumps of Isigny 
butter, while, notwithstanding her stoutness, she dis- 
played an incomparable agility in the exercise of her 
calling. Mme. Cibot had now arrived at that time of 
life when women of her type are obliged to — shave ; 
in other words, she was forty-eight. A portress with 
a mustache is one of the strongest guarantees for order 
and security that a landlord can possibly have ! Had 
Delacroix but seen Mme. Cibot, leaning proudly on 
the handle of her broom, he would assuredly have painted 
her in the character of Bellona ! Singular as the state- 
ment may appear, it was ordained that the position of 
the Cibots, baron and feme (to use the legal style) should 
one day influence the destiny of the two friends. The 
faithful historian therefore is obliged to enter into sun- 
dry details concerning the porter and his wife. 

The house which they superintended brought in about 
eight thousand francs a year ; for, in that part of it 
which abutted on the street, there were three complete 
sets’ of apartments occupying the whole depth of the 
building ; while in the old mansion that stood between 
court and garden there were three other sets. Then, in 
addition, there was a shop that opened on to the street 
and was occupied by a marine store dealer named 
Remonencq, who, having for some months past assumed 
the rank of an old curiosity dealer, was so well acquainted 


68 ‘‘specimen of the porter.” 

with Pons’ attainments in bric-a-brac-ology that from 
the recesses of his shop he would bow to the old mu- 
sician as he passed to and from the house. The rental 
of the house then being about eight thousand francs, the 
sou per livre yielded about four hundred francs per 
annum to the Cibots, who, moreover, had nothing to 
pay for lodging or fuel. Now, since Cibot’s earnings 
amounted, on an average, to between seven and eight 
hundred francs a year, the income of the worthy couple 
(Christmas-boxes included) reached a total of sixteen 
hundred francs, every doit of which they spent ; for the 
scale of living was higher than that of the lower orders. 
“ We can live but once,” was a favorite saying with 
Mme. Cibot, who, born during the Revolution, was, as is 
clear, quite ignorant of the catechism. 

Through her connection with the Cadran-Bleu, this 
portress with the scornful orange-colored eye had 
acquired — and she still retained — a certain skill in the 
art of cookery which made her husband an object of 
envy to all his fellow-porters. Thus it came to pass that 
the Cibots, having arrived at full maturity, and being 
indeed on the verge of old age, had not laid by even so 
much as a hundred francs. Well clothed and well fed, 
they were, moreover, looked up to in the neighborhood 
by reason of their six-and-twenty years of unimpeacha- 
ble integrity. If they had no money neither did they 
owe a single centime, or nune centime^ as Mme. Cibot 
phrased it ; for the good lady, in talking, was lavish of 
her ;/’s. Thus she would say to her husband : “Youn’are 
n’a love.” Why? As well might you ask the reason of 
her indifference with regard to religion. 

But while both of the Cibots prided themselves on 
their open and above-board mode of life, on the esteem 
in which they were held throughout six or seven 


‘^SPECIMEN OF THE PORTER.” 


69 


neighboring streets, and on the liberty, which their 
landlord conceded to them, of ruling the house accord- 
ing to their own good will and pleasure, they groaned 
in secret over 4 heir lack of invested capital. Cibot 
complained of pains in his hands and legs, and Mme. 
Cibot was heard to lament that her “ poor Cibot ” was 
still obliged to work at his time of life. The day is 
coming when, after thirty years of such a life, a porter 
will accuse the government of injustice, and deem him- 
self entitled to be enrolled in the Legion of Honor ! 

Whenever the tittle-tattle of the district spread abroad 
the news that such and such a servant, after eight or ten 
years service, had been put down in a will for an annu- 
ity of three or four hundred francs, lodge after lodge 
resounded with lamentations, which may give some idea 
of the envy that pervades the humbler walks of life in 
Paris. “ Ah ! it never happens to tis porters to be men- 
tioned in a will ! We haven’t a chance ! And yet we 
are more useful than servants. Ours is a position of 
trust ; we help to make money ; ’tis we who guard the 
granary ; and yet we are treated just like dogs, and 
there’s an end of it.” “Life is all chance work,” Cibot 
would say, as he took a coat home. “ If I had only left 
Cibot to look after -the lodge,” Mme. Cibot would 
exclaim, as with her hands resting on her salient hips 
she stood chatting to a neighbor, “if I had but left Cibot 
to look after the lodge, and taken a situation as cook, 
we should have had as good as thirty thousand francs 
invested by this time ! I’ve made a mess of life all along 
o’ living rent free in a good snug lodge, and wanting 
for nothing.” 

When, in 1836, the two friends came and occupied in 
common the second story of the old mansion, they caused 
a kind of revolution in the Cibot household ; for both 


70 ‘‘specimen of the porter.” 

Schmucke and Pons having been accustomed to employ 
the porter or portress of the house in which they lived 
as their housekeeper, were entirely of one mind when 
they installed themselves in the Rue de Normandie as 
to coming to some arrangement with Mme. Cibot. Mme. 
Cibot, accordingly, became their housekeeper at a salary 
of twenty-five francs per month — that is to say, twelve 
and a half francs for each of them. 

After the lapse of a year the promoted portress reigned 
supreme over the establishment of the two old bachelors 
just as she reigned supreme over the house of M. 
Pillerault, the great-uncle of Mme. la Comtesse Popinot ; 
their business was her business ; and she always spoke 
of them as “ My two gentlemen.” In short, when she 
found that the Pair of Nut-Crackers were gentle as 
lambs, easy-going and unsuspicious, in fact, thorough 
children, she obeyed the instincts of her heart — the heart 
of a woman of the people — and began to protect and 
worship her “ two gentlemen and to serve them with 
a devotion so genuine that she even gave them a few 
words of warning and shielded them from all the 
impositions which swell the cost of living in Paris. Thus, 
for five-and-twenty francs a month the two bachelors 
undesignedly and unwittingly obtained a mother ; and 
— the value of that “ mother ” once perceived — proceeded 
to acknowledge it by artless eulogies and thanks and by 
little presents, which all tended to lighten the bonds of 
this domestic alliance. Mme. Cibot set a thousand times 
as much store on being appreciated at her true value as 
she did upon being paid ; and this sentiment, as every- 
body knows, invariably makes up for slender wages. 
Cibot undertook errands, repairs, all that appertained 
to his department, in connection with the wants of his 
wife's “two gentlemen,” for half price. 


SPECIMEN OF THE PORTER.” T1 

To conclude, in the second year after the installation 
of Pons and Schmucke in the Rue de Normandie a fresh 
element of friendship was introduced into the alliance 
between the porter’s lodge and the second floor. In the 
indulgence of his indolence and his desire to shirk the 
material cares of life, Schmucke made a bargain with 
Mme. Cibot, whereby for fifteen sous a day — that is, 
forty-five francs per month, she undertook to provide 
him w'ith breakfast and dinner ; whereupon Pons, find- 
ing that his friend’s breakfast was very satisfactory, 
followed suit by making an arrangement to pay eighteen 
francs a month for breakfast. This system of provision- 
ing, which swelled the gross revenues of the lodge to 
the extent of about ninety francs per month, made the 
two tenants inviolable beings, angels, cherubim, gods. 
Indeed, it is very doubtful whether the King of the 
French — who knows something of the subject — be served 
so well as were the Pair of Nut-Crackcrs. The milk they 
drank came unwatered from the can ; they saw the 
newspapers of the tenants of the first and third floors 
gratis — for the occupants of those floors rose late, and 
would have been told, in case of emergency, that their 
papers had not yet come — and, moreover, Mme. Cibot 
kept the clothes, the rooms, the landing outside the 
rooms, in short, all the belongings and surroundings of 
the two old men in a state of Flemish neatness. As for 
Schmucke, he was happier than he had ever hoped to be ; 
Mme. Cibot made life easy to him ; he, gave her six 
francs a month to look to the washing and mending of 
his linen, and fifteen francs a month he spent upon 
tobacco These three items of expenditure reached a 
monthly total of sixty-six francs ; which multiplied by 
twelve makes seven hundred and ninety-two francs ; 
add two hundred and twenty francs for rent and taxes, 


72 


LIVmG COPY.’’ 

and you have a total of one thousand and twelve francs. 
Schmucke’s clothes were made by Cibot, and the mean 
cost of these necessaries was a hundred and fifty francs j 
so that this profound philosopher lived upon twelve 
hundred francs a year. How many persons in Europe, 
whose one idea is to go and live at Paris, will be agree- 
ably surprised to learn that it is possible to live there in 
comfort on an income of twelve hundred francs in the 
Rue de Normandie in the Marais under the wing of a 
Mme. Cibot ! 

When Mme. Cibot saw old Pons returning home at 
five in the evening she was utterly astounded. Not only 
was the thing itself unprecedented, but “ her gentleman ” 
passed her without saluting her. 

“ Well, Cibot !” said she to her husband, “ Monsieur 
Pons must either have come in for a million or gone 
mad !” 

“It certainly looks like it,” replied Cibot, dropping a 
coat-sleeve in which he was inserting what in tailors’ 
slang is called a poniurd. 


CHAPTER VII. 

“a living copy of the fable of the two pigeons.” 

At the very moment when Pons had- terminated his 
automatic journey homeward, Mme. Cibot was putting 
the finishing touch to Schmucke’s dinner, which con- 
sisted of a certain whose savor pervaded the entire 

court. The dish consisted of pieces of boiled beef 
bought at a cook-shop — which did a little in the regrat- 


73 


‘‘a living copy.” 

ing line — and fricasseed with butter and finely chopped 
onions until the meat and onions had entirely absorbed 
the butter, so as to give this porter’s dainty the appear- 
ance of a fry. This dish concocted con amore by Mme. 
Cibot for her husband and Schmucke^ between whom 
she divided it, sufficed, when flanked by a bottle of beer 
and a morsel of cheese, for the wants of the old German 
music- master ; and rest assured that not even King 
Solomon himself in all his glory dined any better than 
Schmucke did. This dish of beef fricasseed with onions ; 
fragments of chicken in ragoilt j at one time some cold 
meat dressed with vinegar and parsley and a bit of fish 
served up with a sauce of Mme. Cibot’s own invention 
— a sauce so piquant that with it a mother might have 
eaten her own baby quite unsuspectingly — at another a 
slice or two of venison ; such according to the quantity 
and quality of the provisions re-sold by the restaurants 
on the boulevard to the cook-shop in the Rue Boucherat ; 
such was the usual fare of Schmucke ; who^accepted 
without a murmur w-hatever “ goot Montame Zipod ” 
provided for him. And good Mme. Cibot had, day by 
day, curtailed the bill of fare until she had brought it 
within the purchasing power of twenty sous. 

“I’ll go and find n’out what’n has happened to him, 
poor dear man,” quoth Mme. Cibot to her spouse, 
“for here’s Monsieur Sqhmucke’s dinner quite ready.” 

Thereupon Mme. Cibot covered the deep earthenware 
dish with a plate of common china, and, in spite of her 
age, contrived to reach the apartments of the two friends 
just as Schmucke was opening the door for Pons. 

“Vat is de matter wit you, mefn goot friend?” said 
the German, startled at the total alteration in Pons’ 
countenance. 


74 


“ A Livmo COPY.” 

“I will tell you all; but first I am going to dine 
with you.” 

“To tine! To tine!” exclaimed the enraptured 
Schmucke. “But no; dat is imbossible,” added he, 
as the thought of his friend’s gastrolatry occurred 
to him. 

At this juncture the old German caught sight of Mme. 
Cibot (w’ho, in the exercise of her rights as lawful 
[house] wife, was listening to the conversation) and one 
of those bright ideas, which flash into the mind of 
genuine friendship only, occurred to him. Darting to 
the door, he dragged her out on to the landing, and 
said to her : 

“ Montame Zipod, dis goot Bons lofs goot tings ; go 
to de Gatran-Bleu ; order ein nice little tinner ; anjo- 
vies, maggaroni — ein feast fit for Lugullus !” 

“ What may that be ?” inquired Mme. Cibot. 

“Why ! Feal d la pourcheoise^" replied Schmucke, “ein 
goot feesh, ein bottel of glaret, all de best tings dat dey 
have ; some grogettes of rise, and some smoked bagon ! 
Bay for it ; but say not one wort, I will rebay you 
to-morrow morning.” 

When Schmucke returned to the room his face wore a 
joyous expression, and he was rubbing his hands ; but 
as he listened to the recital of the unlooked-for troubles 
that had just swept down upon the heart of his friend, 
the features of the old German gradually resumed an 
expression of amazement. He tried to console Pons by 
painting the world from a Schmuckean point of view ; 
Paris was simply a perpetual whirlwind ; Parisians, both 
men and women, were borne along in a waltz of furious 
rapidity ; one ought to be quite independent of the 
world, which regards outward appearances only, and 
cares nothing for “ de inner man,” said Schmucke. 


75 


A UVINO COPY.” 

Then he proceeded to relate for the hundredth time how 
the only three pupils whom he had ever loved, and who 
had a tender regard for him — young ladies for whom he 
would lay down his life, and who were even so good as 
to allow him a small yearly pension of nine hundred 
francs, to which each contributed her share of about 
three hundred francs — had entirely forgotten to come 
and see him, and had not been able to receive him when 
he called upon them any time during the last three 
years: it is true that Schmucke used to call upon these 
ladies of fashion at ten o'clock in the mornmg ; and, 
moreover, that the quart^ly installments of his allow- 
ance were paid into the hands of notaries. 

“And yet,'’ pursued Schmucke, “ dey have hearts of 
gold ; in fact, dey are my leetle Saint Cecilias, jarming 
ladies, Montame^ de Bordentuere, Montame de Fen- 
tenesse, and Montame di Tillet. When I see dem it is 
in de Jambs-Elysees, and dey do not see me ; but dey do 
lofe me veil, and I could go and tine wit dem ; dey 
would be ferry glat ; I gould go to deir gountry seats ; 
but I moche prefer to be wit my friend Bons, begause I 
gan see him whenever I like, and effery tay.” 

Pons seized the hand of Schmucke, and, placing it 
between his own hands, gave it a squeeze which was 
intended to convey all the feelings that he could not 
express in words ; and for several minutes the two 
friends remained thus hand in hand, like two lovers 
meeting after a protracted separation. 

“ Tine here effery tay !” resumed Schmucke, who was 
silently invoking a blessing on the cruelty of Madame 
Camusot. “ Gome now ! we will pric-a-prac togedder; 
and de tevil will neffer put his tail into our home.” 

In order that the reader may understand the full hero- 
ism of the words — “ we will pric-A.-prac togedder ” — he 


A LIVING COPY. 


7B 

should be informed that Schmucke’s ignorance of bric- 
a-brac-ology was crass. It was only the strength of his 
friendship that had preserved him from breaking some 
of the objects contained in the saloon and closet that 
had been given up to Pons as a museum. Schmucke, 
whose whole mind was devoted to music, who composed 
music for his own sake — looked upon all the little knick- 
knacks of his friend much as a fish (supposing that a fish 
could receive a card of invitation) might look upon a 
flower-show at the Luxembourg. He respected these 
wonderful works, simply because Pons showed so much 
respect for them when he was dusting his treasures ; and 
Schmuckp would respond to the ecstacies of his friend 
with a-^“Yes, it is ferry pretty” — just as a mother 
replies, with fond unmeaning phrases, to the gestures of 
a child that is too young to talk. Since the two friends 
had lived together. Pons had bartered his time-piece for 
another, to Schmucke’s knowledge, no fewer than seven 
times ; and on each occasion had gained by the exchange. 
Pons now possessed a magnificent time-piece by Boule, 
an ebony time-piece inlaid with copper and carved, a 
time-piece in Boule’s first manner ; (for Boule had two 
manners, just as Raphael had three : in his first manner 
Boule married copper to ebony ; in his second, against 
his own conviction, he devoted himself to tortoise-shell, 
and accomplished marvels, in endeavoring to outdo his 
competitors, the inventors of tortoise-shell marquetry.) 
But Schmucke, in spite of Pons’ learned dissertations, 
did not perceive the slightest difference between the 
magnificent time-piece in Boule’s first manner, and its 
six predecessors. Still, seeing how much pleasure Pons 
derived from these baubles^ as Schmucke termed them, 
Schmucke took more care of them than Pons himself did. 

We need not, then, be astonished that Schmucke’s 


LIVING COPY.’' 77 

heroic exclamation should have had power to subdue 
the despair of Pons ; the old German’s — “We will pric- 
a-prac togedder ” — meant : “ I will spend money on bric- 
a-brac, if you will dine at home, with me.” 

“Dinner is on the table, gentlemen,” said Madame 
Cibot, entering the room and making the announcement 
with wonderful aplomb. 

Pons’ surprise, when he saw and tasted the dinner, 
provided for him through Schmucke’s friendly care, 
may be readily imagined. But the feelings which Pons 
now experienced — feelings that arise but rarely in a life- 
time — are never called forth by that calm unvarying 
devotion whereby one friend perpetually intimates to 
anoth-er — “In me, you have a second self — for to that 
one grows accustomed. No ; such feelings as these owe 
their origin to the contrast between such proofs as Pons 
was now receiving of the happiness of home life, and the 
brutalities that we meet with in society. It is the world, 
it is the world that incessantly renews the ties which 
bind lover to lover and friend to friend — when noble 
heart is wedded to noble heart by love or friendship. 

Even thus it was with Pons and Schmucke, both of 
whom were affected even to tears. Not a word passed 
between the-m ; but they loved each other more than 
ever, and, from time to time, exchanged a friendly little 
nod, which acted like a healing balm poured into the 
wounds inflicted by Madame Camusot’s “pebble,” on 
the heart of Pons. Schmucke, meanwhile, was rubbing 
his hands with such violence as seriously to endanger 
the skin ; he had hit upon one of those inventions which 
surprise a German only when it has been suddenly 
hatched in a brain congealed by the respect due to the 
sovereign princes of the Fatherland. 

“Mein gooc Bons !” — began Schmucke. 


78 A LIVING COPY.'” 

“ I know what you are going to say ; you wish us to 
dine together every day.’’ 

“I wish dat I were rich enough to giff you soche a din- 
ner effery day,” replied the worthy German, in a 
melancholy tone. 

Madame Cibot, to whom Pons occasionally gave an 
order for the boulevard theaters, and thus raised himself, 
in her affections, to a level with her boarder Schmucke, 
now interposed with the following suggestion : 

“Asking parding, gentlemen,” said she, “for three 
francs, I can provide a dinner for two — without wine — 
every day ; a dinner fit to make you lick your plates as 
clean as if they had been washed.” 

“ De fact is,” replied Schmucke, ” dat on de tings dat 
Madame Zibot gooks for me, I tine petter dan de folks 
who eat de king’s fictuals.” 

Animated by his hopes, the habitually respectful Ger- 
man went so far as to imitate the irreverence of the 
minor journals by ridiculing the fixed tariff of the royal 
table. 

“Indeed?” said Pons. “Well, I will try the 
experiment to-morrow.” 

When Schmucke heard this promise he sprung from 
one end of the table to the other, dragging with him 
tablecloth, dishes and bottles, and clasped Pons in an 
embrace the intensity of which can be compared only to 
the eager combination of one gas with another, for 
which it has a chemical affinity. 

“ What habbiness !” exclaimed Schmucke ; while 
Madame Cibot, who also was touched, proudly 
remarked : 

“ Then it is settled that monsieur will dine here every 
day!” 

Unconscious , of the vent to which she was indebted 


79 


‘‘a living copy/’ 

for the realization of her dream, the worthy matron 
went down to her lodge, and entered it with an air 
worthy of Josepha herself, when she first appears upon 
the scene, in the opera of “ William Tell.” Dashing 
down the plates and dishes. Dame Cibot called out to 
her husband : 

“ Cibot, go and fetch two small cups of coffee from 
the Cafe Turc ! And tell the waiter who serves it that 
they are for me !” 

Then sitting down, and placing her hands upon her 
powerful knees, Madame Cibot glanced through the 
window, at the wall that faced the house, and 
exclaimed : 

“ I will go this very evening and consult Madame 
Fontaine !” Madame Fontaine was fortune-teller to all 
the cooks, ladies’-maids, footmen, porters, etc., etc., in 
the Marais — “Since these two gentlemen came here, we 
have put two thousand francs into the Savings Bank 
in eight years ! What luck ! Now, must I give Mon- 
sieur Pons full value for his money, and so attach him 
to his home ? Mistress Fontaine’s hen will tell me 
that.” 

Not having seen any relatives call upon Pons or 
Schmucke during the course of nearly three years, 
Madame Cibot cherished the hope that she would be 
remembered in the wills of “ her gentlemen ;” and 
actuated by this avaricious thought — a tardy growth 
among her mustaches of hitherto untainted probity — 
she had served the old men with redoubled zeal. By 
going out to dine. Pons had, up to this date, avoided 
that complete subjection in which the portress desired 
to hold “her gentlemen.” The nomad existence led by 
the old troubadour-collector, had put to flight the 
vague ideas of captivation which had flitted through 


80 


‘‘a living copy.” 

the brain of Madame Cibot ; but, from the date of this 
memorable dinner, they developed into a formidable 
scheme. 

After the lapse of a quarter of an hour, Madame Cibot 
reappeared in the dining-room, armed with two cups of 
excellent coffee, flanked by two liqueur-glasses of kir- 
schenwasser. 

“ Long liff Montame Zibod !” cried Schmucke ; “ she 
guessed what I wanted.” 

After the parasite had indulged in sundry Jeremiads, 
which Schmucke combated by just such coaxing phrases 
as the home-keeping pigeon must have addressed to the 
pigeon who went abroad, the two friends sallied forth 
together. Schmucke did not like to leave his friend 
alone, in the state to which he had been reduced by the 
conduct of the Camusot household (masters and ser- 
vants.) He knew Pons’ disposition well, and felt that, 
seated in the orchestra, on his conductor’s stool, he might 
be assailed by reflections of the most gloomy description, 
which would destroy the good effect of his return to the 
nest. As Schmucke accompanied Pons home, at about 
twelve o’clock at night, he passed his arm through that 
of Pons, and, treating him as a lover treats the mistress 
whom he idolizes, pointed out to him where the pave- 
ment ended and where it recommenced, and warned 
him when they came to a gutter. Schmucke could have 
wished that the streets were paved with down, that the 
sky were blue, that the angels would fill the ears of 
Pons with the music which they played to him ; for he 
had conquered, in the heart of Pons, the last, the only 
province that was not already his ! 

During three months nearly. Pons dined with 
Schmucke every day. But, in the first place, this altera- 
tion in his mode of life compelled him to curtail his 


“a living copy.” 81 

expenditure on bric-a-brac, by about eighty francs per 
month (for, in addition to the forty-five francs which he 
paid for his dinner, his wine cost him five-and-thirty 
francs) ; and, in the second place, spite of the attentions 
and German witticisms of Schmucke, the old artist 
missed the dainty dishes, the liqueurs, the excellent 
coffee, the chit-chat, the artificial politeness, the society 
and the scandal of the houses in which he formerly 
dined. We cannot, in the decline of life, shake off a 
habit of thirty-six years’ standing. ’Tis but an ungener- 
ous fluid that a hogshead of wine, at a hundred and 
thirty francs the hogshead, pours into the cup of an 
epicure ; so that every time Pons carried his glass to 
his lips, he recalled, with a thousand keen regrets, the 
choice vintages of his Amphitryons. And lastly, at the 
expiration of three months, the cruel pangs, which had 
well-nigh broken Pons’ sensitive heart, were deadened ; 
he had forgotten all but the attractions of society, just 
as an aged lover mourns for the flagrantly unfaithful 
mistress whom he has been compelled to abandon ! 

Although Pons did his best to conceal the profound 
melancholy to which he was a prey, it was sufficiently 
obvious that the old musician was the victim of one of 
those inexplicable maladies, whose seat is in the mind. 
In order to throw some light upon this species of nos- 
talgia arising from the rupture of a habit, suffice it to 
point out one of those thousand trifles which enmesh 
the mind in an unyielding net-work, just as a coat of 
mail incases the body in steel. 

One of the keenest delights, then, of Pons’ former 
life — a delight that is common to all diners-out — was 
the surprise^ the impression made upon the palate by the 
extraordinary dish, the dainty with which, in bourgeois 
circles, the mistress of the house crowns the repast when 


82 


‘‘a livino copy.” 

she wants to give the dinner a festive air. The 
stomach-seated joy was now lost to Pons; for Madame 
Cibot piqued herself upon presenting him with a verbal 
bill of fare. Thus the periodic stimulus of Pons’ life 
was wholly gone ; his dinner proceeded without that 
element of surprise, which formerly, in the houses of our 
forefathers, was known as “ the covered dish !” Now all 
this was quite unintelligible to Schmucke : Pons’ deli- 
cacy of feeling deterred him from complaining ; and, if 
there be anything in the world more melancholy than 
neglected genius, ’tis a stomach that is not understood ! 
Unrequited love — that threadbare catastrophe — is based 
upon an artificial want ; for if we are forsaken by the 
creature, we can love the Creator ; He has treasures in 
abundance to dispense. But the stomach ! — no, there is 
nothing that can be compared to the sufferings of the 
stomach ; for, before all things — Life ! Pons mourned 
over the loss oficertain creams — genuine poems ; certain 
white sauces — masterpieces of art ; certain truffled fowls 
— sweet as love’s young dream ; and, above all, those 
celebrated carps of Rhine which are to be had only in 
Paris, and oh ! with what condiments ! At intervals, 
when his thoughts reverted to Count Popinot’s cook, he 
would ejaculate — “ Oh, Sophie !” The casual passenger 
who overheard this sigh, would have supposed that the 
worthy man was thinking of his mistress ; but he was 
thinking of something far more rare — a well-fed carp ! 
a plump carp served up with a certain sauce, thin in the 
tureen, thick upon the tongue — a sauce that merited 
the Prix Montyon. Brooding over the memory of 
these dinners of other days, the old musician — victim 
of the homesickness of the stomach — lost a good deal 
of flesh. 

Towards the end of January, 1845, that is to say, at 


“A i.rvixr; corv. 


the beginning of the fourth month of Pons’ probation, 
the young flutist, who, like the vast majority of Ger- 
mans, was christened Wilhelm, and — to distinguish him 
from all the Wilhelms, though it by no means distin- 
guished him from all the Schwabs — was surnamed 
Schwab, deemed it necessary to enlighten Schmucke as 
to the condition of the leader of the orchestra, which 
was attracting a good deal of attention at the theater. 
On the occasion, therefore, of a certain first representa- 
tion, when the old German was necessarily present, 
Wilhelm Schwab said to him, pointing to old Pons, who 
was gloomily taking his place at his desk : “ Poor old 

Pons is breaking; there is something wrong with him ; 
his eye is dull, and the movements of his arm are 
feebler than they used to be.” 

“ It is always so, when beoble are sigsty,” replied 
Schmucke. 

Like that mother of whom we read in “The Chroni- 
cles of the Canongate,” whose desire to have her son 
with her for twenty-four hours longer leads to his being 
shot, Schmucke was capable of sacrificing Pons to the 
pleasure of seeing him at dinner every day. 

“ Every one belonging to the theater is uneasy ; and, 
as our first danseuse^ Mademoiselle Heloise Brisetout, 
remarks, he doesn’t make any noise when he blows his 
nose, now.” 

Formerly, when the old musician blew his nose, he 
seemed to be playing on the horn ; so loud was the 
sound which he drew from his long and deep proboscis 
beneath the handkerchief ; in fact, one of the most com- 
mon grounds of complaint against Cousin Pons, on the 
part of Madame Camusot, was this very noise. 

“ I woot giff almost anyting to zave him ; he finds 
life wearisome,” said Schmucke. 


8 - 1 : 


A LIVING COPY.’’ 

“ Upon my word,” said Wilhelm Schwab, “ Monsieur 
Pons seems, to me, to be so superior to us poor devils, 
that I did not dare to invite him to my wedding ; I 
am going to be married.” 

“Married! How.'' In what way?” inquired 
Schmucke. 

“Oh! in all loyalty and honor,” replied Wilhelm 
Schwab, who fancied that Schmucke’s question covered 
a joke — a joke of which that perfect Christian was 
utterly incapable. 

“ Now, gentlemen, to your places,” said Pons, glanc- 
ing at his little army in the orchestra, when he heard 
the tinkle of the manager’s bell. 

Thereupon the band struck up the overture to “La 
Fiancee du Diable,” a fairy piece that had a run of a 
couple of hundred nights. At the first entr' acie Wil- 
helm and Schmucke found themselves alone together 
in the deserted orchestra. The atmosphere of the house 
registered 32^ Reaumur. 

“Will you dell me your story?” said Schmucke 
to Wilhelm. 

“ Look ; do you see that young man in the stage-box 
there ? Do you recognize him ?” 

“ Not in de least.” * 

“Ah ! because he has'a pair of yellow gloves on, and 
is surrounded with the halo of affluence ; but for all 
that, it is my friend, Fritz Brunner, of Frankfort- 
on-Main.” 

“What ! de berson who used to gome into de orghes- 
tra and sit bezide you to see de play ?” 

“The very same. Isn’t such a metamorphosis quite 
incredible ?” 

The hero of the promised story was one of those 
Germans in whose faces you can trace the somber 


LIVING COPY.” So 

sarcasm of Goethe’s Mephistopheles and the jolly good- 
fellowship of the romances of Auguste Lafontaine, of 
pacific memory ; cunning and simplicity ; the keen 
commercial spirit and the studied recklessness of a 
member of the Jockey Club ; but, above all, that dis- 
taste for life that puts a pistol into the hand of Werther, 
weary of Charlotte — much more weary of the German 
princes. Fritz Brunner’s face, in truth, was typical of 
Germany ; it was a medley of Israelitish guile and of 
simplicity, of stupidity and courage, of that knowledge 
which begets disgust, and that experience which stands 
disarmed before the merest puerility. An excessive use 
of beer and of tobacco had left their traces on the fea- 
tures ; and then — to heighten all these antithesis — there 
was a diabolical sparkle in the fine but faded azure 
eyes. While dressed with all the elegance of the 
banker, Fritz Brunner was conspicuously bald. The 
scanty locks that penury and dissipation had spared 
clustered in bright red curls on each side of his head ; 
so that when the days of his financial restoration 
dawned, he still retained the privilege of paying the 
barber. His face, once fresh and handsome, had now 
contracted a certain harshness of tone which, height- 
ened by a red mustache and tawny beard, gave to the 
features an almost sinister aspect. In Brunner’s strife 
with sorrow, his pure blue eyes — those eyes in which an 
enraptured mother had once beheld a divine replica of 
her own — had lost their pristine clearness. Now, this 
premature philosopher, this young old man, was the 
work of a step-mother. 

Here begins the curious history of a prodigal son of 
Frankfort-on-Main, the strangest and the most extraor- 
dinary phenomenon that ever presented itself in that 
sage, though central, city. 


86 


A PRODIGAL SON. 


a 


?7 


CHAPTER VIII. 

“ WHICH SHOWS THAT PRODIGAL SONS, WHEN THEY HAIL 
FROM FRANKFORT-ON-MAIN, END BY BECOMING BANKERS 
AND MILLIONAIRES.” 

Mr. Gideon Brunner, the father of our Fritz, was one 
of those celebrated innkeepers of Frankfort-on-Main, 
who conspire with the bankers to bleed, according to 
law, the purse of the traveler. This worthy Calvinist 
had married a converted Jewess, and owed the elements 
of his fortune to her marriage portion. When her boy 
Fritz was twelve years old, the Jewess died, leaving him 
to the guardianship of his father, and the supervision of 
his uncle, a furrier at Leipsic, and head partner in the 
firm of Virlaz & Co. This uncle, who was by no means 
so pliable as his furs, insisted on Brunner senior placing 
young Fritz’s fortune — which consisted of a pile of marcs 
banco — in the house of Al-Sartchild, and there leaving 
it. 

By way of revenging himself for this Israeli tish 
exigence, Brunner senior married again, under the pre- 
text that it was impossible for him to manage his vast 
hotel without the helping hand and eye of a woman. 
His second wife, the daughter of another innkeeper, he 
took lo be a pearl ; little did he know the nature of an 
only daughter, the idol of her father and her mother. 
The second Mrs. Brunner was what all young German 
women are, when they happen to be frivolous and mali- 
cious. She dissipated her fortune, and avenged the first 
Mrs. Brunner, by making her husband’s home the most 


87 


“a I’RODIGAL SON.” 

miserable of all homes within the territory of the free 
city of Frankfort-on-Main, whose millionaires ('tis said) 
are going to pass a municipal law to compel the women 
to devote their attentions exclusively to home and 
family. 

This German lady loved the various kinds of vinegar, 
to which the Germans apply the general term Rhine 
wine. She loved Parisian knick-knacks for the toilet, 
and had a passion for riding and for dress. In fact, the 
only costly things she did not love were — women. 

She contracted an aversion for little Fritz, and would 
have driven him mad, if that young product of Calvin- 
ism and Judaism had not had Frankfort for his birth- 
place, and the house of Virlaz, of Leipsic, as his guard- 
ian ; but Uncle Virlaz, being entirely wrapped up in his 
furs, confined his vigilance to the marcs banco ; and left 
the child to the tender mercies of its step-mother. 

This hyena was all the more infuriated against the 
cherub-child of the beautiful Madame Brunner, inas- 
much as she herself remained childless. Actuated by a 
diabolical motive, this criminal German woman launched 
young Fritz, so soon as he had attained his majority, 
into the most anti-Germanic dissipations ; her hope 
being that English horses, Rhine vinegar, and Goethe’s 
“ Margarets ” would deal the finishing blow to the child 
of the Jewess and h\s fortune ; for Uncle Virlaz had left 

fine inheritance for his little Fritz so soon as he should 
become of age. But if the gaming-tables of the German 
Waters and the friends of Fritz’s German Wines — among 
which friends we must include Wilhelm Schwab — man- 
aged to knock down the Virlaz capital, the youthful 
prodigal survived, to serve — in accordance with the will 
of the Lord — as an awful warning to youths in the city 
of Frankfort-on-Main ; .where every family used his 


88 


A PRODIGAL SON.” 

name as a scarecrow, to confine its children, prudent and 
alarmed, within the limits of its iron strong-room, lined 
with marcs banco. Instead of dying in the prime of life, 
Fritz Brunner had the pleasure of seeing his step-mother 
interred in one of those charming cemeteries, in which 
the Germans, under the pretense of showing respect to 
their departed friends,' abandon themselves to their 
unbridled passion for horticulture. 

The second Mrs. Brunner having predeceased her 
parents, Brunner senior had absolutely nothing to show 
for all the money that she had extracted from his strong- 
box, and all the troubles she had caused him — troubles 
so heavy, that this inn-keeper with the constitution 
of a Hercules, was, at the age of sixty-seven, as ema- 
ciated as if he had been attacked by the famous poison 
of the Borgias. 

To miss his wife’s fortune after enduring his wife for 
ten years, turned this inn-keeper into a second ruin of 
Heidelberg, a ruin which underwent (’tis true) continual 
repairs from the rechnungs of the guests ; just as the 
ruins of Heidelberg are repaired, with a view to keeping 
up the enthusiasm of the tourists, who come in troops to 
see these ruins that are so well kept up. 

The old man’s condition was as much talked about at 
Frankfort as a bankruptcy would have been. People 
would point at Brunner and say, “ See to what a state a, 
bad wife, whose fortune one does not come in for, and a 
son educated in the French style, may reduce a man.” 

In Italy and Germany every misfortune that happens 
is imputed to the French ; they are the target for every 
bullet ; “but the God pursuing his career,” etc., etc., as 
in the ode of Lefranc de Pompignan. 

The effects of the anger of the landlord of the Grand 
Hotel of Holland did not exhaust themselves upon the 


A PRODIGAL SON. 


89 


a 


j) 


tourists, whose bills {rechnungs) bore the imprint of his 
grievances. When his son was completely ruined, 
Gideon, regarding him as the indirect cause of all his 
father's misfortunes, refused him bread and water, salt, 
fire, house-room and — the pipe ! — the refusal of which, 
by a father, who is an inn-keeper and a German, is the 
lie plus ultra of paternal^ malediction. 

The authorities of the district, not taking into consid- 
eration the original shortcomings of the father, and 
looking upon him as one of the most unfortunate of 
men in Frankfort-on-Main, espoused his cause, expelled 
Fritz from the territory of that free city, and declared 
against him, a German feud. 

The law is neither more humane, nor wiser, at Frank- 
fort, than it is elsewhere — although that city is the seat 
of the Germanic Diet. How seldom does a judge 
ascend the stream of crime and misery, in order to dis- 
cover who held the urn whence the first trickling tribu- 
tary flowed ! It Brunner forgot his son, his son’s friends 
followed the example of Brunner. Whence sprung this 
German with the deeply tragic face who had landed in 
elegant Paris amid all the bustle of a first representa- 
tion, and was there, in a stage-box alone ? Such was the 
question which the journalists, the lions, the sundry 
Parisian ladies among the audience, were putting to 
themselves. Ah ! if the story that has just been told, 
could have been acted in front of the prompter’s box, 
for the benefit of that assembly, it would have made a 
far finer drama than the fairy piece, “ La Fiancee du 
Diable although it would have been not the first but 
the two hundred thousandth representation of the sub- 
lime parable that was acted in Mesopotamia, three 
thousand years before the birth of Christ. 

When Fritz was expelled from Frankfort, he went on 


90 PRODIGAL SON.” 

foot to Strasbourg, and there encountered something 
that the prodigal son of Scripture did not encounter in 
the land of Holy Writ ; something that reveals the supe- 
riority of Alsace, prolific in generous hearts, to prove to 
Germany the beauty of the combination of French wit 
and German solidity. Wilhelm Schwab, who had just 
succeeded to the fortune of his father and mother, now 
master of a hundred thousand francs, received Fritz 
with open arms, open heart, open house and open purse. 
To attempt to describe the sensations of Fritz at the 
moment when, dusty, miserable, quasi-leprous as he 
was, he found, on the other bank of the Rhine, a real, 
substantial twenty-franc piece in the hand of a genuine 
friend, would be to undertake an ode such as Pindar 
only could launch into the world — in Greek — to fan the 
embers of expiring friendship. Add the names of Fritz 
and Wilhelm to those of Damon and Pythias, of Castor 
and Pollux, of Pylades and Orestes, of Dubreuil and 
Pmeja, of Schmucke and Pons, and to all the fancy 
names we give to the two friends of the Monomotapa 
(for La Fontaine, like a man of genius, as he was, has 
placed before us semblances of men without substance 
and without reality.) You may add these two new 
names to our roll of celebrities, with all the more prO' 
priety, in that Wilhelm devoured his heritage in com- 
pany with Fritz, just as Fritz had drunk his, in com- 
pany with Wilhelm — smoking at the same time (be it 
always understood) every species of tobacco that 
is grown. 

Improbable as it may seem, the two friends con- 
sumed this heritage in the breweries of Strasbourg, 
after the most foolish and most vulgar fashion possible 
— in the society of the ballet-girls of the Strasbourg 


91 


“ A PRODIGAL SON.” 

Theatre, and of certain Alsatian damsels, who had worn 
their little brooms to the very stump. 

At the same time, not a morning dawned but they 
would say to each other : “ This may be all very well, 

but we must pull up, come to some resolution, and do 
something with the money that is left.” “ Oh ! just 
this one day,” Fritz would remark, “ but to-morrow.” 
“ Oh, yes, to-morrow!” 

In the life of the debauchee, To-day is a tremendous 
coxcomb ; To-7norrow is a great coward, scared by the 
courage of his predecessor; To-day is the swa^shbuckler 
of the old comedy ; To-niorrow is the phantom of our 
existing pantomimes. When the two friends had come 
to their last thousand-franc note they booked places at 
the Messageries which are called royal, and so reached 
Paris, where they found quarters at the Hotel du Rhin 
in the Rue du Mail, which was kept by one Graff, 
formerly head-waiter to Gideon Brunner. On the 
strength of Graff^s recommendation, Keller Brothers 
engaged Fritz as one of their clerks, at a salary of six 
hundred francs a year. 

Now Graff, the landlord of the Hotel du Rhin, is a 
brother of Graff, the celebrated tailor. The tailor took 
Wilhelm into his service as bookkeeper. Graff, the 
hotel-keeper, deemed these two posts not nearly good 
enough for the two prodigal sons, when he called to mind 
his own apprenticeship at the Hotel de Hollande. 

These two facts — the recognition of a poor friend by a 
rich one, and the interest taken by a German innkeeper 
in ]a fellow-countryman without a farthing, may lead 
some persons to suppose that this history is a romance ; 
but, in these days, truth is all the more like fiction, in 
that fiction takes such great pains to resemble truth. 

Fritz, clerk at a salary of six hundred francs, and 


1)2 A PRODIGAL son/’ 

Wilhelm, bookkeeper at the same remuneration, found 
it very difficult to exist in a city so seductive as Paris ; 
so, in 1837, after they had been in Paris two years, 
Wilhelm, who had great talent as a flutist, and was 
desirous of sometimes having a little butter on his 
bread, joined the orchestra over which Pons presided. 
As for Fritz, he could supplement his income only by 
the exercise of that financial capacity with which, as a 
scion of the Virlaz stem, he \^as endowed. In spite of 
his application — perhaps on account of his talents — it 
was not till 1843 that the Frankfortian succeeded in 
getting two thousand francs a year. Penury, that 
divine step-mother, did for these two young men what 
their own mothers had been unable to do for them ; she 
taught them economy, knowledge of the world, knowl- 
edge of life ; she gave them that grand, that potent 
education of chastisement, which she imparts to all men 
destined to be great ; all of whom are unhappy in their 
youth. 

Fritz and Wilhelm, being but ordinary men, did not 
lay to heart all the lessons of Penury ; they did their 
best to keep out of the way of her blows ; they found 
her bosom flinty and her arms lean, nor could they 
extract from those arms the good fairy Urgela who 
yields to the caresses of men of genius. But they did 
learn the full value of Fortune, and resolved to clip her 
wings, if ever she returned to their door. 

“Well! Father Schmucke, I can explain the whole 
matter in one word,” pursued Wilhelm (who had told 
the whole of this story to the pianist, in German.) 
“ Brunner senior is dead. He was, unavowedly to his 
son and to Monsieur Graff (with whom we lodge), one 
of the original promoters of the Baden railways, out of 
which he made immense profits. He leaves a fortune 


03 


“ A PRODIGAL SON.” 

of ;j^i6o,ooo. This is the last night that I shall play the 
flute. But for its being a first night I should have left 
some days ago, but I did not wish my part in the music 
to be wanting.” 

“ Dat is right, young man,” said Schmucke. “But 
whom are you going to marry ?” 

“ The daughter of Monsieur Graff, our host, the land- 
lord of the Hotel du Rhin. I have loved Mademoiselle 
Emilie these seven years ; she has read so many 
immoral novels that she has refused every offer for my 
sake, without knowing what might be the upshot. The 
young lady will be very rich, for she is sole heiress of 
the Graffs, who are tailors, in the Rue de Richelieu. 
Fritz is going to give me five times what we squandered 
together at Strasbourg — five hundred thousand francs ! 
A million francs he devotes to the establishment of a 
bank, to which Monsieur Graff, the tailor, contributes 
five hundred thousand francs ; the father of my future 
wife permits me to invest her portio'n (which amounts to 
two hundred and fifty thousand francs) in the same 
establishment, and will invest an equal sum on his own 
account. Thus the house of Brunner, Schwab & Co. 
will have a capital of two million five hundred thousand 
francs. Fritz has just bought shares in the Bank of 
France to the amount of fifteen hundred thousand 
francs, to guarantee our account there. But that is not 
the whole of Fritz’s fortune ; there are, besides, some 
houses at Frankfort, which belonged to his father, and 
are reckoned to be worth a million francs. He has 
already let the Grand Hotel de Hollande to a cousin of 
the Graffs.” 

“You look very sadly at your friend,” replied 
Schmucke, who had listened to Wilhelm attentively ; 
“ are you envious of him ?” 


94 : 


A PRODIGAL SON.’’ 


“ I am not envious ; but I am jealous for Fritz’s happi- 
ness,” said Wilhelm. “ Is that the face of a man who is 
happy ? I dread Paris on his account. I wish he would 
do as I am doing. The old Adam may awake in him 
again. Of our two heads, ’tis not his that has acquired 
the greater share of ballast. That toilet, that eyeglass, 
all that sort of thing, makes me uneasy ; he has looked 
at nothing in the theater, except the lorettes. Ah ! if you 
only knew how difficult it is to persuade Fritz to marry ! 
He has a horror of that which in France is termed ^ faire 
la courl We shall have to launch him into married life, 
as — in England — they launch a man into eternity, chat 
is to say — with a halter round his neck.” 

Amid the tumult that marks the conclusion of a first 
representation “ the flute ” gave the invitation to his con- 
ductor, and Pons accepted it with glee. For the first 
time in three months, Schmucke saw a smile on the face 
of his friend. He conducted Pons back to the Rue de 
Normandie in silence ; for by that gleam of joy he rec- 
ognized the intensity of the malady from which his friend 
was suffering. That a man so truly noble, so disinter- 
ested as Pons, a man of such elevated sentiments, should 
have such weaknesses was an inexplicable puzzle to the 
stoical Schmucke ; terribly sad he grew, for he felt 
that — in the interests of Pons’ happiness — he ought to 
renounce the pleasure of seeing his ^*goot Bans” sitting 
opposite to him at the dinner-table every day ; and 
Schmucke did not know whether he could bear to make 
so great a sacrifice. This notion drove him mad. 

The proud silence maintained by Pons, stationed on 
the Mount Aventine of the Rue de Normandie, had, nec- 
essarily, attracted the notice of Mme. Camusot ; but 
once freed from her parasite, she troubled herself but 
little about him. She, in common with her '‘charming 


95 


“a prodigal son.” 

daughter, landed that her cousin had fathomed the 
trick of her little Lili ; but with the president things 
were very different. 

President Camusot de Marville, a short, stout little 
man who, since his promotion, had grown solemn, was 
an admirer of Cicero, and preferred the Opera Comique 
to the Italian Opera ; compared actor with actor ; fol- 
lowed in the footsteps of the ruck ; repeated, as his own, 
all the articles in the ministerial journal ; and, in giving 
his decisions, paraphrased the ideas of the councilor who 
preceded him. This magistrate, the leading features of 
whose character were sufficiently well known, and who 
was forced by his position to take a serious view of 
every subject, had a particular regard for family ties. 
Like most husbands who are entirely governed by their 
wives, the president affected, in minor matters, an inde- 
pendence which his wife did not infringe. 

During a whole month he was contented with the com- 
monplace reasons assigned by his wdfe for Pons’ disap- 
pearance ; but at length he began to think it strange that 
the old musician — a friend of forty years standing — had 
discontinued his visits, immediately after making so con- 
siderable a present as the fan of Mme. de Pompadour. 
At the Tuileries, where this fan, which Count Popinot 
had recognized as a masterpiece, was handed round, it 
had procured for Mme. Camusot sundry compliments 
extremely gratifying to her vanity. The beauties of its 
ten ivory branches, each of which was carved with inim- 
itable delicacy, were pointed out to her in detail. At 
Count Popinot’s a certain Russian lady — the Russians 
always fancy themselves in Russia — offered Mme. 
Camusot six thousand francs for this extraordinary fan ; 
she was amused at seeing it in such hands, for it was 
undoubtedly fit for a duchess. 


96 


"a prodigal son.” 

One cannot deny our poor cousin the credit of thor- 
oughly understanding these little bits of trumpery,” 
quoth Cecile to her father the morning after the Russian 
princess’ offer. 

'‘'‘Little bits of trumpery T exclaimed the president; 
“ why, the State is about to give three hundred thousand 
francs for the collection of the late Monsieur Conseiller 
Dusommerard, and to contribute, in conjunction with 
the city of Paris, half a million of francs toward the 
purchasing and repairing of the Hotel Cluny, in order 
to house '‘these little bits of trumpery' 

“ ‘ These little bits of t7'umpery^ my dear child, are often 
the only traces that remain to us of civilizations that 
have perished. An Etruscan vase, a necklace (which are 
worth, one, forty thousand ; the other, fifty thousand 
francs) are ^little bits of trumpe7y' that reveal to us the 
perfection of the arts at the time of the siege of Troy, 
while proving to us that the Etruscans were Trojans who 
had taken refuge in Italy.” 

Such was the style of the stout little president’s wit ; 
he assailed his wife and daughter with clumsy irony. 

“ The combination of acquirements which ‘ these little 
bits of trumpery' demand, is a science which is called 
Archaeology. Now, Archaeology embraces architecture, 
sculpture, painting, the art of working in the precious 
metals, the ceramic art, the art of cabinet-making (quite 
a modern art), lace, tapestry — in short, every product of 
human labor.” 

“ Cousin Pons is quite' a sava7it, then ?” said Cecile. 

“ Ah ! by the way, that reminds me ; why don’t we 
ever see him now?” inquired the president, with the air 
of a man under the influence of an emotion, produced 
by a thousand forgotten impressions, which suddenly 



PRESIDENT CAMUSOT REBUKING THE SERVANTS.— -S'ee Page 99. 


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PROBtGAL SON.’^ 97 

coalesce, and — to use a term common among sports- 
men — font balle. 

“ Oh ! he must be huffed about some trifle or other,” 
replied Mme. Camusot. “ Perhaps I have not shown 
myself sufficiently appreciative of the gift of this fan ; I 
am, as you know, very ignorant — ” 

“ You ! one of Servin’s most accomplished pupils ! 
You / not know Watteau !” interrupted the president. 

“ I know David, Gerard, Gros ; and Girodet and 
Guerin and Monsieur de Forbin and Turpin de 
Crisse — ” 

“ You ought to have — ” 

“ What ought I to have done, monsieur ?” asked the 
lady, looking at her husband with a Queen of Sheba air. 

“Known whac Watteau is, my dear'; he is very much 
the fashion,” resumed the president, with a humility 
which showed how great were his obligations to his 
wife. 

This conversation occurred some days before the 
first representation of “The Fianc6e du Diable,” when 
all the members of the band were struck by Pons’ sickly 
appearance. But, in the interim, those persons who were 
accustomed to see Pons at their tables, and to employ 
him as a messenger, had been making inquiries ; and 
there had arisen, in the circle in which the old man’s 
orbit lay, a feeling of uneasiness which was increased by 
the fact that several persons had seen him at his post in 
the theatre. In spite of the pains taken by Pons to avoid 
his former acquaintances when he came across them in 
his walks, he one day found himself face to face with 
the quondam minister. Count Popinot, at the shop of 
Monistrol, one of those famous and audacious dealers of 
the new Boulevard Beaumarchais, whom Pons had once 
mentioned to Mme Camusot, and whose wily enthusi- 


98 


PRODIGAL SON.” 

asm from day to day raises the price of curiosities ; 
which (they say) are becoming so scarce that it is now 
impossible to find any. 

“ My dear Pons, why do we never see you now ? You 
have quite forsaken us ; and Madame Popinot does not 
know what to make of your desertion of us.” 

“ There is a certain house, Monsieur le Comte,” replied 
poor Pons — “ the house of a relative — in which I have 
been made to understand that a man of my years is an 
incumbrance to society. I was never received with any 
great show of politeness ; but, at all events, up to that 
time I had never been actually insulted. I never asked 
any one for a farthing,” he added, with ali an artist’s 
pride. “ In return for certain attentions, I frequently 
made myself useful to those from whom I received them ; 
but ic would seem that I was laboring under a delu- 
sion ; that I was liable to unlimited tax and toll, in 
return for the honor which my friends — my relatives — 
conferred upon me, by admitting me to their tables. 
Well ! I have resigned my office of parasite.- I find every 
day in my own home that which no table could offer 
me — a genuine friend !” 

These words, imbued as they were with all that bitter- 
ness which the old artist was still capable of infusing 
into them by the aid of tongue and gesture, made so deep 
an impression on the peer that he took the worthy 
musician aside and said to him : 

“ Come now, my old friend, what has happened to 
you ? Can you not impart to me in confidence what it 
is that has wounded you ? You will allow me to point 
out to you that at my house you have never been treated 
otherwise than with respect.” 

“ You are the only exception that I make,” said the 
worthy man, “and besides, are a great nobleman, a 


99 


PRODIGAL SON.” 

statesman ; the demands on your time and attention 
would, if need were, have furnished an excuse for every- 
thing.” 

Yielding to the influence of the diplomatic tact 
acquired by Popinot in the management of men and in 
the conduct of business. Pons was at length induced to 
recount the wrongs that he had suffered in the house of 
the President de Marville ; and Popinot so heartily 
espoused the victim’s cause that, on reaching home, he 
immediately mentioned the matter to Mme. Popinot. 
That worthy and excellent woman expostulated with 
Mme. de Marville the next time that the two ladies met ; 
and the ex-minister, on his part, having made some 
observations on the subject to the president, a family 
explanation took place at the house of the Camusots de 
Marville. Now, although Camusot was not entirely 
master in his own house, neither his wife nor his daugh- 
ter could deny the justice of a remonstrance that had so 
solid a foundation both oi law and fact ; so they kissed 
the rod and blamed the servants The servants having 
been summoned and censured, found grace only by 
making a clean breast of the whole matter ; thus prov- 
ing to the president how entirely justified Cousin Pons 
was in remaining at home. Under these circumstances 
the president acted as'all men under petticoat-government 
would have acted ; he displayed his dignity as a hus- 
band and a judge, by announcing to his servants that 
they would be dismissed (and thus lose all the advan- 
tages that might accrue to them from their long stay in 
his service) unless, from that time forth, his cousin Pons 
and all who did him (the president) the honor to visit 
ac his house, were treated, as he himself was treated — an 
expression that drew a smile from Madeleine. 


100 


work of art.” 

“ Indeed, you have but one chance of escape,” said the 
president ; “ you must disarm my cousin by apologizing 
to him. Go and tell him that your remaining here 
depends entirely on him ; for I shall send you all away, 
unless he forgives you.” 


CHAPTER IX. 

“ IN WHICH PONS TAKES MADAME LA PRESIDENTE A WORK 

OF ART A LITTLE MORE PRECIOUS EVEN THAN A FAN.” 

The next day the president set off betimes to pay a 
visit to his cousin before the sitting of the court. The 
appearance of M. le President de Marville, heralded by 
Mme. Cibot, was quite an event. Pons, who never in 
the whole course of his life, had received the honor 
of a visit from the president, felt that reparation was 
at hand. 

“ My dear cousin,” said the president, after the cus- 
tomary compliments had been interchanged, “ I have at 
last discovered the cause of your secession. Your con- 
duct increased — if that be possible — the esteem in which 
I hold you. Now I will say but one word on this point : 
my servants are all under notice to quit ; my wife and 
daughter are in despair ; they want to see you, and offer 
you an explanation. I can assure you that throughout 
the whole of this affair there has been one innocent per- 
son, and that person is a certain elderly judge you wot 
of ; don’t punish me then for the escapade of a giddy 
little girl who wanted to dine with the Popinots ; espe- 
cially seeing that I am come to sue for peace, with an 


101 


work of art.” 

acknowledgment that we — and we alone — are in the 
wrong. After all, a friendship of thirty-six years stand- 
ing — even supposing that it has received a shock — is not 
without its rights. Come, now, sign the treaty of peace 
by dining with us this evening.” 

Hereupon Pons contrived to get entangled in a diffuse 
reply, and wound up by announcing that he was engaged 
to be present that evening at the troth-party of one of 
the performers in his orchestra, who was flinging his 
flute to limbo in order to become a banker. 

“Well, then, to-morrow.” 

“ My cousin, Madame la Comtesse Popinot, has sent 
me an invitation for to-morrow, couched in the most 
flattering terms — ” 

“ Then the day after to-morrow,” persisted the 
president. 

“ The day after to-morrow, my first flute’s partner — a 
German — a Monsieur Brunner — returns the betrothed 
the civility that he received from them to-day.” 

“Your amiability affords an ample explanation of the 
zeal with which people compete for the pleasure of your 
company,” said the president. Then, after a moment’s 
pause, he added: “ Well, then, let it be next Sunday 
se’nnight, as we say at the palace.” 

“ Why, on that day we are going to dine with a Mon- 
sieur Graff, the father-in-law of the flutist — ” 

“Well, be it Saturday then; between that time and 
this you will find time to reassure a little girl, who has 
already been crying over her fault. All that even God 
demands is penitence ; will you be more exacting with 
poor little Cecile than the Omnipotent Himself?” 

Pons, thus assailed at his weakest points, took refuge 
in phrases that were more than polite, and escorted the 
president to the head of the stairs. An hour later the 


102 


“A WORK OF ART. 


7 ? 

president’s servants found their way in a body to Pons’ 
lodgings. As the manner of servants is, they cringed, 
they cajoled, they even cried ! As for Madeleine, she 
led Monsieur Pons aside, and throwing herself reso- 
lutely at his feet: “’Twas I, monsieur,” said she, 
“ ’tvvas I who did it all ; and monsieur knows full well 
that I love him,” she added, bursting into a flood of 
tears. “It is to the revengeful feelings boiling within 
me that monsieur must attribute all this unhappy busi- 
ness. We shall lose our annuities! — monsieur, I was mad, 
and I should not like my fellow-servants to suffer for 
my madness. I see now quite plainly that fate did not 
intend me for monsieur’s wife. I have argued the mat- 
ter with myself ; I own I have looked too high, but, 
monsieur, I love you still. For ten years my one dream 
of happiness has been to make you happy, and to look 
after all that you have here ! Oh ! if monsieur only 
knew how much I love him ! but he must have read it in 
all my acts of malice : if I were to die to-morrow — 
what would they find ? A \Vill, monsieur, in your 
favor; yes, monsieur, a will in your favor — in my trunk, 
under my jewels !” 

By touching this chord Madeleine awakened in the 
bosom of the old bachelor that feeling of gratified 
vanity to which the fact of having inspired a passion, 
even in a person who is distasteful to us, will always 
give rise. Having generously forgiven Madeleine, Pons 
extended his forgiveness to all the other servants, and 
told them that he would speak to his cousin, Mme. 
Camusot, in order to save them from being sent away. 
Thus, then, to his ineffable delight. Pons found himself 
restored to all his habitual enjoyments, without having 
stooped to any act of meanness : instead of his going to 
the world, the world had come to him ; his character, 


103 


“a work of art.” 

therefore, would gain, instead of losing, dignity. But 
when he came to explain his triumph to his friend 
Schmucke, Pons had the mortification of seeing him look 
sad and full of unuttered doubts. Nevertheless, at sight 
of the sudden change that had taken place in Pons’ 
countenance the worthy German , acquiesced in the 
immolation of the pleasure which he had derived from 
having his friend all to himself for nearly four months. 

Moral maladies are in one respect far less terrible than 
physical — they are instantaneously cured by the grati- 
fication of the desire from whose defeat they spring. On 
this morning Pons became quite a different being ; the 
melancholy moribund old man gave place to the self- 
contented Pons whom we saw conveying the fan of Mme. 
de Pompadour to Mme. de Marville. Schmucke, mean- 
while, pondered deeply over this phenomenon, yet failed 
to comprehend it ; for the genuine stoic will never 
understand the courtesanry of the Frenchman. Now, 
Pons was a genuine Frenchman of the Empire, in whom 
the gallantry of the eighteenth century was combined 
with the devotion to the fair sex so highly extolled in 
the romances “ Partant pour la Syrie,” etc., etc., etc. 
Schmucke buried his sorrows in his heart, and covered 
them with the flowers of German philosophy ; but within 
eight days he turned quite yellow, and Mme. Cibot 
had to resort to strategy in order to introduce the doctor 
of the district to Schmucke’s sick-room. This doctor 
feared that the old German was suffering from an icterus^ 
and left Mme. Cibot staggered by that learned word 
which, being interpreted, simply means the jau7idice. 

And now — for the first time, probably, in the course 
of their acquaintance — the two friends were about to 
dine out together ; though, so far as Schmucke was 
concerned, this dinner was merely a trip to Germany. 


10 : 1 : “ A WORK OF ART.” 

In fact, Johann Graff, the landlord of the Hotel du Rhin, 
and his daughter Emilie, Wolfgang Graff the tailor, and 
his wife, Fritz Brunner and Wilhelm Schwab, were 
Germans one and all — Pons and the notary being the 
only French people admitted to the banquet. The tailor 
and his spouse, who owned a splendid mansion in the 
Rue de Richelieu, between the Rue Neuve-des-Petits- 
Champs and the Rue Villedo, had undertaken the bring- 
ing up of their niece, whose father, not unreasonably, 
entertained a very strong dislike to his daughter’s com- 
ing into contact with the heterogeneous crowd that 
haunts a hostelry. These worthy tailor folks, who loved 
the child as if she had been their own, gave up the 
ground floor of their abode to the young couple. ’Twas 
in this spot also that the banking-house of Brunner, 
Schwab & Co. was to have its headquarters. These 
details had been settled about a month previously ; for 
that was the time required for realizing the fortune of 
Brunner, the author of all this felicity ; and during the 
interval, the home that was to receive the young couple 
had been richly redecorated and furnished at the expense 
of the celebrated tailor. The wing that connected the 
old mansion between court and garden, with a fine 
house abutting on the street, had been converted into 
bank-offices. 

As the two friends journeyed from the Rue de 
Normandie to the Rue Richelieu, Pons extracted from 
the absent-minded Schmucke the details of this new 
edition of the story of the prodigal son, for whom Death 
had killed the fatted — innkeeper. Pons, under the 
influence of his recent reconciliation with his nearest rela- 
tives, was immediately fired with the desire to unite Fritz 
Brunner and Cecile Camusot in the bonds of wedlock. 
As chance would have it, the notary of the brothers Graff 


105 


‘‘a work of art.” 

was no other than the son-in-law and successor of Cardot, 
formerly second head-clerk in Cardot’s office, and at 
whose house Pons often dined. 

“What, is it you, Monsieur Berthier ?” said the old 
musician, holding out his hand to his ex-Amphitryon. 

“ And pray why have you ceased to do us the honor of 
dining with us, as you formerly did ?” inquired the 
notary. “ My wife was anxious about you. Then we 
saw you at the first representation of ‘ The Fiancee du 
Diable,’ and our anxiety was converted into curiosity.” 

“ Old men are sensitive,” replied the worthy man. 
“ They have the demeric of being just a century behind 
the age ; but what is to be done.? It is quite as much 
as they can do to represent one epoch ; they cannot 
belong to the epoch in which they die.” 

“Ah!” said the notary, with a knowing look, “ one 
hare and one century at a time, eh ?” 

“ Oh, by the way, why don’t you find a husband for 
my cousin Cecile de Marville ?” asked the worthy man, 
taking the young notary into a corner of the room. 

“Ah, why indeed ?” replied the notary. “In this age, 
when luxury has penetrated even to our porters’ lodges, 
young men pause before uniting their destiny to 
that of a daughter of a president of the Court Royal of 
Paris, when that daughter’s portion is only a hundred 
thousand francs. In the class in which the husband of 
Mademoiselle de Marville must be sought for, you can 
not find a woman who costs her husband only three 
thousand francs a year. The interest on such a portion, 
then, will barely defray the annual expenses of the 
lady’s toilet. A bachelor with an income of fifteen or 
twenty thousand francs lives in a pretty entresol ; the 
world does not expect him to make any display ; he 
may do with a single servant ; he can devote his whole 


106 “ A WORK OF ART.” 

income to his amusements ; the only decorum he need 
study, he can buy — at his tailor’s. Caressed by all far- 
seeing mothers, he is one of the kings of fashionable 
Paris. A wife, on the other hand, needs an establish- 
ment ; she monopolizes the carriage ; if she goes to the 
play she wants a box, whereas the bachelor pays for a 
stall only. In fact, the wife is the exclusive representa- 
tive of the fortune which formerly the bachelor repre- 
sented alone. Suppose that your married couple have 
thirty thousand francs a year ; as things are now, the 
rich bachelor degenerates into a poor devil who has to 
count the cost of a trip to Chantilly. Are there any 
children ? then the parents are positively poor. Now, 
seeing that Monsieur and Madame de Marville are 
barely fifty, the expectations are purely reversionary for 
fifteen or twenty years ; no bachelor cares to carry them 
in his portfolio so long as that ; and let me tell you that 
a calculating spirit has so deeply corroded the hearts of 
the unsophisticated young sparks who dance the polka 
at Mabille with lorettes^ that all marriageable young 
men study the two aspects of the problem without 
needing our exposition of the subject. And, between 
you and me. Mademoiselle de Marville leaves the hearts 
of her suitors quite calm enough to allow their heads to 
work ; and the result is that they all of them indulge 
in these anti-matrimonial reflections. If any young 
fellovv in possession of his senses and — an income of 
twenty thousand francs — forms a quiet little programme 
of marriage in harmony with his ambitious ideals. 
Mademoiselle de Marville does not at all correspond to 
it — ” 

“And why not?” asked the astonished musician. 

“ Oh !’’ replied the notary, “ in these days almost 
every bachelor, though he be as plain as you and I are. 


107 


WORK OF art/’ 

my dear Pons, has the impudence to expect a wife with 
a marriage portion of six hundred thousand francs, 
with good blood in her veins, plenty of good looks, wit 
and education — a girl without a flaw — in short, a para- 
gon.” 

“Then my cousin will have great difficulty in finding 
a husband ?” 

“She will not find one until her father and mother can 
make up their minds to add Marville to her portion ; 
had they been willing to do that she would now be 
Viscomtesse Popinot — but see, here is Monsieur Brun- 
ner ; we are going to read the partnership deed of the 
house of Brunner & Co., and also the contract of 
marriage.” 

When the persons present had been introduced to one 
another and the customary compliments interchanged. 
Pons — who had been requested by the relatives of the 
parties to sign the contract as a witness — heard the 
deeds read. The party adjourned to the dining-room at 
about half past five. The dinner was one of those 
sumptuous entertainments which men of business give 
when they fling away its cares for a season. The viands 
clearly showed that Graff, the landlord of the Hotel du 
Rhin, had relations with the best provision dealers in 
Paris. Never had Pons or Schmucke witnessed such 
good cheer. There were dishes on the table that were 
fit to ravish the mind — German paste of unexampled 
delicacy, smelts incomparably fried, a Geneva ferra with 
the genuine Genevese sauce, and then there was a sauce 
for plum-pudding that would have astounded the famous 
London physician who is said to have invented it. The 
company did not leave the dinner-table until ten o’clock. 
The quantity of Rhine wines and o*f French wines con- 
sumed would have astonished the dandies ; for the 


108 


“a work of art.” 

amount of fluids which a German can imbibe without 
exhibiting a single trace of exhilaration, transcends all 
knowledge. To gain any idea of it one must dine in 
Germany and behold bottle follow bottle (as wave suc- 
ceeds to wave on some lovely Mediterranean strand) 
disappear just as if the Germans possessed the absorb- 
ent powers of sponge and sand. But this process goes 
on harmoniously, unaccompanied by French noise and 
clatter : the talk remains as frigid as the rhetoric of a 
money-lender ; the faces flush after the fashion of those 
of the brides whom we see in the frescoes of Cornelius 
or Schnor, that is to say — imperceptibly ; while tales of 
the past flow from the lips as slowly as the smoke curls 
upward from the pipe. 

At about half past ten. Pons and Schmucke were seated 
on a bench in the garden, with the quondam flutist 
between them. They were discussing — with a very 
hazy notion of what they were talking about — their 
respective dispositions, opinions and misfortunes. In 
the midst of this hotch-potch of confidences, Wilhelm 
mentioned his anxiety to get Fritz married, and dilated 
on the topic with vinous eloquence and force. 

“What say you to the following programme for your 
friend ?” whispered Pons to Wilhelm. “ A charming 
young lady, full of good sense ; age twenty-four ; 
family of the highest distinction ; father occupying one 
of the highest seats on the judicial bench ; marriage 
portion, one hundred thousand francs ; expectations a 
million francs.” 

“ Stop ! I will go and mention it to Fritz at once,” 
replied Wilhelm. 

Thereupon the two musicians beheld Brunner and 
his friend walking round and round the garden, passing 
and repassing, and alternately speaking and listening. 


109 


‘'a woek of aet.” 

Pons’ head was somewhat heavy — though he was not 
actually drunk — but his intellect was as active as its cor- 
poreal envelope was inert. Through the diaphanous 
haze that wine produces, he watched Fritz Brunner, 
and was bent upon tracing in his features indications of 
a desire for the joys of married life. Schwab lost no 
time in bringing his friend and partner and presenting 
him to M. Pons ; whereon Fritz Brunner thanked the 
old gentleman for the trouble he deigned to take in the 
matter. A conversation then ensued, in the course of 
which the two old bachelors. Pons and Schmucke, 
lauded marriage to the skies and — with the utmost pos- 
sible innocence — gave vent to the double entendre^ that 
“ marriage is the end of man.” When amid the service 
of ices, tea, punch and cakes in the future apartments of 
the betrothed, the worthy tradesmen, nearly all of whom 
were drunk, learned that the sleeping partner in the 
banking-house was about to follow the example of his 
associate, the hilarity of the evening reached its 
climax. 

It was two o’clock in the morning when Pons and 
Schmucke wended their way homeward along the boule- 
vards, philosophizing as they went, on the musical 
arrangement of things mundane until all trace of mean- 
ing was entirely lost. 

On the morrow Pons repaired to the house of the 
president — his heart overflowing with the profound 
delight that arises from returning good for evil. Poor 
dear good soul ! He assuredly attained to the sublime, 
as every one will admit, since we live in an age when 
the Montyon prize is awarded to those who do their 
duty by following the precepts of the Gospel. 

“ Ah ! They will be under deep obligations to their 


no 


A WORK OF ART. 


ce 


51 


parasiteif’ he said to himself as he reached the Rue de 
Choiseul. 

A man not wrapped up, as Pons was, in measureless 
content, a man of the world, a suspicious man would, on 
returning to that house under such circumstances, have 
observed Mme. Camusot and her daughter. But the 
poor musician was a child, a guileless artist whose faith 
in the non-existence of moral deformity equaled his 
devotion to aesthetical beauty ; and, accordingly, the 
worthy man was enchanted with the blandishments 
lavished on him by Cecile and her mother. He who 
for the last twelve years had looked on while vaudeville, 
comedy and drama were being performed, was com- 
pletely taken in by the grimaces of the social comedy ; 
long familiarity with them had, no doubt, dulled his 
perceptive faculties in that regard. The covert hatred 
that Mme. Camusot bore her husband’s cousin since she 
had placed herself in the wrong may be easily imagined 
by those who frequent Parisian society and have 
grasped the aridity — both mental and physical — of 
Mme. Camusot (ardent only in the pursuit of distinc- 
tions, and rabid with virtue), her hollow piety and 
arrogance — the arrogance of a woman who rules the 
roast at home. It will be understood, then, that all 
the demonstrative attentions of mother and daughter 
cloaked a formidable thirst for vengeance — vengeance 
that was obviously only deferred. For the first time 
in her life Amelie was in the wrong, and the husband, 
whom she henpecked, in the right ; and — to crown all 
— she was compelled to make a show of affection 
toward the instrument of her defeat ! Such a situation 
has no analogue except in the enmities that smolder for 
long years in the sacred college of cardinals or in the 
chapters of the heads of religious orders. When, at 


Ill 


‘‘a work of art.” 

three o’clock, the president returned from the palace, 
Pons had scarcely finished his account of the marvelous 
incidents that led to his becoming acquainted with 
Frederick Brunner, of the dinner of yesterday evening, 
which had lasted till morning, and of all that concerned 
the aforesaid Frederick Brunner. Cecile, indeed, had 
come to the point at once by asking questions as to 
Brunner’s style of dress, his height, his figure, the color 
of his hair and eyes ; and then, having conjectured that 
Frederick was a man of distinguished appearance, she 
proceeded to express her admiration of his generous 
disposition. 

“To give five hundred thousand francs to his com- 
panion in misfortune ! Oh ! mamma, I shall have a 
carriage and a box at the Italian Opera.” 

And as she thought of the realization of all her moth- 
er’s ambition on her behalf and the accomplishment of 
the hopes that she had given up hoping, Cecile became 
almost pretty. As for Mme. Camusot, she contented 
herself with uttering the single phrase : “ My dear little 
daughter, you may be a wife within a fortnight.” 

All mothers who have daughters of twenty-three 
address them as little daughters ! 

“ Still, we must have time to make some inquiries,” said 
the president ; “ I will never give my daughter to the 
first man who happens to present himself.” 

“As to inquiries,” replied the old artist, “ the deeds 
were prepared and signed in Berthier’s office ; and as to 
the young man himself, you know, my dear cousin, what 
you yourself said to me. Well, Brunner is over forty ; 
one half of his head is hairless ; he seeks, in family life, 
a haven of refuge from the storms of fate ; I did not 
deter him from entering that haven ; every man to his 
taste.” 


112 


“a work of art.” 

“Then there is all the more reason for our seeing Mr. 
Frederick Brunner,” replied the president. “I don’t 
want to bestow my daughter’s hand on some 
valetudinarian.” 

“Well, cousin,” said Pons, still addressing Mme. 
Camusot, ’’you shall have an opportunity of deciding as 
to the eligibility of my suggested suitor within five days 
time, if you be so minded ; for, viewing the subject as 
you do, a single interview will enable you to arrive at a 
conclusion.” 

Here Cecile and Mme. Camusot made a gesture 
indicative of their delight. 

“ Frederick,” continued Cousin Pons, “ Frederick, who 
is a very distinguished amateur, has begged me to allow 
him to examine my little collection. You have never 
seen my pictures and curiosities ; come and see them,” 
added Pons, addressing his two relatives ; “ you can 
visit my apartments as two ladies introduced by my 
friend Schmucke ; and you will form the acquaintance 
of the intended without being compromised. Frederick 
need not have any idea as to who you really are.” 

“Admirable!” exclaimed the president. 

The attentions showered upon the formerly despised 
parasite may be easily imagined. On this day, at all 
events, the poor man was the cousin of Mme. la 
Presidente. Drowning her hatred in the flood of her 
delight, the glad mother found looks and smiles and 
words that threw the good man into ecstacies ; partly 
on account of the pleasure which he was conferring, and 
partly on account of the future of which he caught a 
glimpse. Would he not, in the houses of Brunner, 
Schwab, and Graff, find dinners resembling that which 
signalized the signing of the marriage-contract? He 
saw before him a land flowing with milk and honey — a 


113 


“a work of art.” 

marvelous succession of covered dishes^' gastronomic 
surprises and exquisite wines. 

“ If Cousin Pons is the cause of our carrying through 
such a piece of business as this,” said the president to 
his wife, when Pons had taken his departure, “we ought 
to secure him an income equal to his salary as conductor.” 

“Certainly,” said Mme. de Marville. 

It was, therefore, agreed and decided that in case the 
intended suitor found favor in Cecile’s eyes she should 
undertake the task of inducing the old musician to 
accept this mean munificence. The president, w'ho was 
anxious to have authentic proof of the fortune of Mr. 
Frederick Brunner, went next day to Berthierthe notary. 
Berthier, who had received an intimation from Mme. 
Camusot, had sent for his new client, Schwab, the 
ex-flute. Dazzled at the prospect of such an alliance 
for his friend — we know how great is the respect of a 
German for social distinctions ; in Germany a woman is 
Mrs. General, Mrs. Counselor, Mrs. Advocate So-and- 
so — dazzled by this prospect, Schwab was as complaisant 
as a collector who thinks that he is overreaching a dealer 
in curiosities. 

“ As I intend to settle my estate of Marville on my 
daughter,” said Cecile’s father to Schwab, “ I should 
above all things desire that the marriage should take 
place under the regime dotal. That being so, I should 
expect Monsieur Brunner to invest a million francs in 
land in order to increase the estate of Marville, and so 
constitute a dotal land property which would render 
my daughter and her children independent of the 
fortunes of the bank.” 

Berthier rubbed his chin as he thought to himself ; 
“ The president knows what he is about.” Schwab, after 
having had the effect of the regime dotal explained to 


114 


‘‘a wokk of art.” 

him, did not hesitate to answer for his friend. The 
dotal clause carried out a wish which he had heard 
expressed by Fritz, namely, that he could discover some 
plan for securing himself from ever relapsing into his 
former penury. 

‘‘ There is at this very time as much as twelve hundred 
thousand francs worth of farms and pasture land for 
sale,” said the president. 

“A million francs invested in Bank of France shares 
will be enough to guarantee our account there,” said 
Schwab. “Fritz does not want to employ more than 
two million francs in business ; he will do what you 
wish, Monsieur le President.” 

The president made his wife and daughter almost 
mad with delight when he told them this news. Never 
had so rich a prize shown itself so docile in the matri- 
monial net. 

“You will be Madame Brunner de Marville,” said the 
father to his daughter ; “ for I will get permission for 
your husband to add that name to his own, and, later 
on, he will have letters of naturalization. If I am made 
a peer of France, he will succeed me !” 

Mme. Camusot devoted five days to the preparation 
of her daughter’s toilet. On the day of the projected 
interview she dressed Cecile with her own hands, equip- 
ping her as carefully as the admiral of the blue 
equipped the yacht of England’s queen when she started 
on her trip to Germany. 

Pons and Schwab, on their part, cleaned and dusted 
the Pons Museum, the apartments and furniture, as 
actively as if they had been sailors swabbing the decks 
of the admiral’s flag-ship. There was not a speck of 
dust to be seen on the carved wood ; every bit of cop- 
per gleamed with the polishing it had undergone ; the 


115 


“a GERMAN IDEA.^’ 

glass coverings of the crayons were so clean that while 
protecting^ they transparently displayed the works of 
Latour, of Greuze and of Liautard— Liautard, the illus- 
trious author of “The Chocolate Pot," the miracle of 
this style of painting, which is, alas, so fugitive. The 
inimitable enamel of the Florentine bronzes glistened. 
The stained windows glowed in all their glorious hues. 
Everything shone after its kind, and breathed its music 
to the soul in that concert of masterpieces, arranged by 
two musicians, both of whom were poets, and poets of 
equal rank. 


CHAPTER X. 

“a GERMAN IDEA.” 

Knowing, and being skilful enough to evade, the diffi- 
culties of a first appearance on the scene, the two women 
were the first to arrive ; for they wished to feel at home. 
Pons introduced his friend Schmucke to his two rela- 
tives ; in whose eyes the old German seemed no better 
than an idiot. Engrossed as they were with the idea of 
a suitor who was a fourfold millionaire, the two dunces 
paid very little attention to the art lectures of the worthy 
Pons They gazed with an eye of indifference upon 
Petitot's enamels, displayed in the red velvet fields of 
three marvelous frames The flowers of Van Huysum 
and of David de Heim, the insects of Abraham Mignon, 
the Van Eycks, the Albert Durers, the genuine Gran- 
achs, the Giorgione, the Sebastien del Piombo, the 
Backhuysen, the Hobbema, the Gericault, the rarities of 


116 GEEMAN IDEA.” 

painting, failed, one and all, to pique their curiosity ; 
for they were waiting for the sun that was to light up 
these treasures. Yet the beauty of certain Etruscan 
jewels and the intrinsic value of the snuff-boxes did 
astonish them. They were in ecstasies — of complai- 
sance — over some Florentine bronzes which they had in 
their hands, when in came Mme. Cibot and announced — 
Monsieur Brunner,” Without turning round they 
profited by a superb Venetian mirror, framed in enor- 
mous pieces of carved ebony, to examine this phenix 
of aspiring swains. 

Frederick, who had received a hint from Wilhelm, ,had 
made the most of the little hair that still remained to 
him ; he wore a becoming pair of trousers of a color that 
was soft though somber, a very elegant silk waistcoat, 
the cut of which was entirely new, an open-work shirt of 
linen, woven by the hand of some Friesland woman, and 
a blue cravat with white stripes. His watch-chain and 
the handle of his cane were the handiwork of Florent 
and Chanor, while, as for the coat. Father Graff himself 
had made it, and of the finest cloth. Gloves of Swedish 
leather bespoke the man who had already devoured his 
maternal fortune. The mere gleam of his varnished 
boots was enough to suggest the little low-hung 
brougham of the banker, even if the ears of the two sly 
gossips had not already heard the rumbling of its wheels 
upon the pavement of the deserted Ruede Normandie. 

When the debauchee of twenty is a chrysalis that is to 
develop into a banker, that debauchee at forty is a 
man of observation ; and the observing faculty of 
Frederick Brunner was all the more acute in that he 
was perfectly well aware to what good account a Ger- 
man may turn his naivete. On this eventful morning 
he had the pensive air of a man who is hesitating as to 


^•A GEEMAN IDEA.” 


117 


whether he shall embrace a married life or continue the 
dissipated career of a bachelor. Such a physiognomy 
on the shoulders of a Frenchified German seemed to 
Cecile superlatively romantic. In the child of the Vir- 
lazes she detected a Werther. (Where can you find a 
young girl who does not introduce a little romance into 
the history of her marriage ?) When Brunner grew 
enthusiastic at the sight of the magnificent works of 
art — the fruit of forty years of patient search — and — 
to Pons’ intense delight — rated them at their real value, 
as no one had till then, Cecile deemed herself the hap- 
piest of womankind. “ He must be a poet !” said Mile, 
de Marville to herself. “ He can see millions in this 
bric-^-brac.” A poet is a man who does not reckon ; 
who allows his wife to pull the purse-strings ; a man 
easily managed ; a man to be amused with trifles. 

Every pane in the two windows of the old man’s room 
was of Swiss stained glass. The smallest of the panes 
was worth a thousand francs, and there were sixteen of 
these masterpieces, which are, nowadays, the goal of 
many a voyage of discovery. 

In 1815 these panes might have been bought for from 
six to ten francs apiece ! The value of the sixty pictures 
— undoubted originals not retouched, but just as they 
came from the master’s hand — of which this glorious 
collection consisted, could be tested only by the fierce 
competition of the auction-room. Each picture was 
incased in a frame, of immense value ; and there were 
specimens of every kind of frame ; there was the Vene- 
tian frame, with its heavy ornaments, resembling those 
of the English plate of these days ; there was the Roman 
frame so remarkable on account of that which artists 
term its fla-fla ; there was the Spanish frame, with its 
bold foliage ; there were Flemish frames and German 


118 “a german idea.^^ 

frames, with their naive figures ; there were tortoise- 
shell frames inlaid with pewter, copper, mother-of-pearl 
or ivory; there were frames in ebony, in boxwood and 
in copper; there was the frame Louis Treize, the frame 
Louis Quinze, the frame Louis Seize — in short, a unique 
collection of the very finest models. More fortunate 
than the curators of the treasures of Dresden and 
Vienna, Pons was the proud possessor of a frame by the 
celebrated Brustolone, the Michael Angelo of wood. 

It was quite natural that Mile, de Marville should 
require an explanatory description of each fresh curios- 
ity that presented itself and that Brunner should initiate 
her into the knowledge of these marvels. Her exclama- 
tions were so naive ; she seemed so pleased to learn from 
Frederick’s lips the value and the beauties of a picture, 
a piece of sculpture or a bronze, that the German fairly 
thawed, and his face resumed its youthful appearance. 
In short, both he and Cecile went further than they 
intended at this first meeting — which, of course, was 
treated as a chance meeting from first to last. 

The seance lasted three hours. When it was over 
Brunner offered his arm to Cecile to conduct her down 
the staircase. As with prudent deliberation she 
descended the stairs still chattering about the Fine Arts, 
she embraced the opportunity of expressing her sur- 
prise at the admiration of her intended for the gewgaws 
of Cousin Pons. 

“You think, then,” said she, “that what we have just 
seen is worth a great deal of money ?” 

“Why, mademoiselle, if your cousin. Monsieur Pons, 
were willing to sell me his collection, I would give him 
eight hundred thousand francs for it this very evening; 
and I should not have made a bad bargain either ; 


119 


“ A GERMAN IDEA.” 

the sixty pictures alone would fetch more than that at 
a public sale.” 

I believe it, since you tell me so,” replied Cecile ; 
“and indeed you must be right, since you took more 
notice of the collection than of anything else.” 

“Oh, mademoiselle!” exclaimed Brunner, “ my only 
answer to your reproach will be to ask Madame 
Camusot to allow me to call upon her in order that I 
may have the pleasure of seeing you again.” 

“ How clever she is, the little darling !” thought Mme. 
Camusot, who was close at her daughter’s heels. “ We 
shall be most delighted to see you, monsieur,” she added 
aloud. “I hope that you will come with our cousin 
Pons and dine with us. My husband, the president, 
will be delighted to make your acquaintance. Thank 
you. Cousin Pons ;” and so saying, she squeezed Pons’ 
arm in so significant a manner that the consecrated 
phrase, “We are friends in life and in death,” would not 
have expressed so much. The glance which accom- 
panied this “Thank you, cousin” was equivalent to 
an embrace. 

After Brunner had seen the young lady to her car- 
riage, and the carriage — a hired brougham — had turned 
the corner of the Rue Chariot, Brunner began to talk 
bric-a-brac to Pons, who was talking marriage to 
Brunner. 

“So you see no impediment !’* remarked Pons. 

“ Oh !” replied Brunner, “ the little girl is insignifi- 
cant, and the mother affected ; we will see about it.” 

“A handsome fortune to come,” observed Pons; 
“more than a million in expect — ” 

“ Let’s postpone the subject till Monday !” replied 
the millionaire. “ If you care to sell your collection of 


120 


“ A GERMATT IDEA.” 

pictures, I would willingly give five or six hundred 
thousand francs — ” 

“ Indeed !” cried the worthy man, who did not know 
he was so rich. “ But no ; I could not part with that 
which makes my happiness — I could only sell my collec- 
tion, to be delivered after my decease.” 

“Well, we will see about it.” 

“There are two pieces of business afloat,” said the 
collector, who was thinking only of the marriage. 

Brunner now took leave of Pons and was whirled 
away in his well-appointed equipage. Pons watched 
the little brougham as it receded ; he did not notice 
Remonencq, who was sitting on the doorstep, smok- 
ing his pipe. 

Wishing to take her father’s advice, Mme. Camusot 
de Marville went that very evening to his house, and 
there found the Popinots, Eager to gratify a little 
feeling of revenge, very natural in a mother who has 
failed in her endeavor to catch the scion of a wealthy 
family, she announced that Cecile was on the point of 
making a splendid match. “ Whom is Cecile going to 
marry then ?” was the question that passed from mouth 
to mouth ; and thereupon Mme. la Presidente, without 
supposing that she was telling her secret, dropped so 
many little hints, and whispered so many little confi- 
dences — which Mme. Berthier took care to confirm — 
that on the following day people were saying, in the 
bourgeois empyrean in which Pons’ gastronomic orbit 
lay — “ Oh ! Cecile de Marville is going to be married 
to a young German, who is about to become a banker 
from pure, philanthropy, for he has a fortune of four 
million francs. He is a hero of romance, a genuine 
Werther, a charming, good-hearted fellow, who has sown 
his wild oats, and has fallen madly in love with Cecile ; 


GERMAN IDEA.” 121 

it is a case of love at first sight, and all the more likely 
to be lasting, inasmuch as Cecile was surrounded by 
rivals — all the painted Madonnas of Cousin Pons,” etc., 
etc. 

On the next day but one after the interview at Pons’ 
rooms, sundry persons presented themselves to offer 
their congratulations to Madame Camusot ; their sole 
object being to discover whether the golden tooth really 
existed. Thereupon the wife of the president performed 
the following admirable variations (which mothers may 
consult, as we used formerly to consult “The Complete 
Letter-Writer.”) 

Thus, to Madame Chiffreville she said : “ A marriage 
is not made until the bride and bridegroom have 
returned from the mairie and the church ; and we have, 
as yet, gone no further than an interview ; so I rely on 
your friendship not to talk about our hopes.” 

“You are very fortunate, Madame la Presidente ; it 
is no easy matter to find husbands for our daughters in 
these times !” 

“ Well ! you know, it is a mere accident ; but mar- 
riages often come about in that way.” 

“ Ah ! so you have found a husband for Cecile ?” said 
Madame Cardot. 

“Yes,” replied Madame Camusot, who fully under- 
stood all the malice of that so; “we were somewhat 
fastidious ; that was what retarded Cecile’s establish- 
ment in life. But now we have found all we required ; 
fortune, amiability good disposition, and an agreeable 
person ; and I must say, that my dear little daughter 
deserved all that. Monsieur Brunner is a charming 
young man, full of distinction ; he is fond of luxury, 
knows what life is, and dotes upon Cecile ; in fact, he 
loves her sincerely. And, spite of his three or four 


122 


A OERMAH IDEA.’’ 

millions, Cecile has accepted him. Our ambition did 
not soar so high, certainly, but, ‘ store is no sore.' ” 

“’Tis not the money that weighs with us ; it is the 
love which my daughter has inspired,” said Madame 
Camusot to Madame Lebas. “Monsieur Brunner is in 
so great a hurry, that he wants the wedding to take 
place immediately after the expiration of the interval 
required by law.” 

“ He is a foreigner — ” 

“ He is, madame ; yet I own that I am quite con- 
tented. Why ! Monsieur Brunner will be to me a son 
rather than a son-in-law. His delicacy is really quite 
captivating. You can not conceive the alacrity with 
which he embraced the proposal that he should marry 
under the rigime dotal. What a great safeguard for 
families that is ! Monsieur Brunner will lay out twelve 
hundred thousand francs in pasture land, which will 
some day be added to Marville.” 

And on the following day there were other variations 
on the same theme. Monsieur Brunner was a grand 
seigneur^ and was acting altogether like a grand 
seigneur ; he never counted cost ; and if Monsieur de 
Marville could obtain letters of naturalization for him — 
and the minister owed Monsieur Camusot a little scrap 
of legislation — the son-in-law would become a peer of 
France. No one knew the extent of Monsieur Brunner’s 
fortune ; he had the finest horses and the finest carriages in 
Paris ; etc., etc. 

The pleasure that the Camusots took in proclaiming 
their hopes, showed how unexpected was their triumph. 

Immediately after the interview at Cousin Pons’ lodg- 
ings, Monsieur de Marville, at the instigation of his 
wife, persuaded the minister of justice, the chief judge 
of his own court, and the attorney-general to dine with 


‘‘a geeman idea.’’ 123 

him on the day fixed for the*introduction of this phenix 
of sons-in-law to the family circle ; and, notwithstand- 
ing the brief notice they had received, the three grandees 
accepted the invitation ; for they all fully understood 
the part assigned to them by paterfamilias, and gladly 
lent him their aid. In France, a mother of a family, who 
is fishing for a rich son-in-law, may count on receiving 
ready help. The Count and Countess Popinot, also, 
contributed by their presence to the splendor of the 
occasion ; (though they thought that to invite thejn 
showed a certain want of good taste.) The dinner-party 
consisted of eleven persons ; for Cecile’s grandfather, 
Camusot senior, and his wife, were indispensable mem- 
bers of a reunion, which, from the standing and posi- 
tion of its members, was intended to bind Monsieur 
Brunner by a definitive engagement, from which it would 
be impossible for him to secede. He had already, as we 
have seen, been described as one of the richest of Ger- 
man capitalists, as a man of taste — did he not love the 
dear little daughter I — and as the future rival of the 
Nucingens, the Kellers, and the Du Tillets. 

“To-day is our reception day,” said Madame la Presi- 
dente, with stupid simplicity, as she ran over the names 
of the guests to the man whom she regarded as her son- 
in-law. “We have none but intimate friends here 
to-day. First, there is my husband’s father, who, as 
you know, is about to be made a peer ; then, there are 
the Count and Countess Popinot, whose son’s suit to 
Cecile we rejected, on account of his not being rich 
enough, though we are still very good friends ; there 
are the minister of justice, our chief president, our 
attorney-general — our friends, in short. We shall be 
obliged to dine rather late, on account of the House, 
which never rises till six o’clock.” 


12i ‘‘a GERMAN IDEA.” 

Brunner looked at Pons in a significant manner, and 
Pons rubbed his hands, as much as to say, “You see 
what sort of friends we have, / have !” 

Madame Camusot (like a clever woman, as she was) 
had something to say to her cousin in private, in order 
to leave Cecile alone with her Werther for a moment. 
Cecile chattered away, and skilfully contrived that 
Frederick should catch a glimpse of a German dic- 
tionary, a German grammar and a Goethe which she 
had hidden. 

“ Ah ! you are learning German !” said Brunner, 
turning red. (It is only French women who can invent 
these little traps.) 

“Oh !” cried Cecile, “how mischievous you are ! It 
is not right, sir, to ransack my little hiding-places in 
that way. I want to read Goethe in the original ; I 
began learning German two years ago.” 

“Then the grammar must be extremely difficult to 
master; for there are only ten pages cut,” replied Brun- 
ner, naively ; whereupon Cecile blushed, and turned 
away in order to hide her confusion. Now, tokens such 
as these, no German can possibly withstand ; and accord- 
ingly, Brunner seized the hand of Cecile, drew her, all 
disconcerted as she was, within the range of his regard, 
and gazed at her, as lovers do gaze at one another, 
in the romances of Auguste Lafontaine of pudibund 
memory. 

“You are adorable!” he murmured. The rebel- 
lious gesture with which Cecile greeted these words 
meant: “And what are you then? Who could help 

loving you V' 

When her mother and Pons rejoined her, she whis- 
pered to the former : “All’s well, mamma.” 

The appearance presented by a family during such an 


“a german idea.” 125 

evening beggars description. Every one was pleased to 
see a mother securing a good match for her child. 
Brunner, who pretended not to understand anything, 
Cecile who understood everything, and the president 
who went about fishing for congratulations, each and all 
received double-meaninged — or double-barreled — felici- 
tations. When Cecile, in an undertone, and in the most 
ingenuous and gingerly manner possible, imparted to 
Pons her father’s intentions with reference to the 
annuity of twelve hundred francs, all the blood in the 
old man’s body seemed to be tingling in his ears ; he 
felt as if all the gas-jets in the foot-lights of his theatre 
were flaring before hiS eyes, and he flatly declined the 
offer, assigning as a reason for his refusal the revelation 
which had fallen from Brunner’s lips as to the value of 
the Pons Museum. 

The minister, the chief president, the attorney- 
general, all the busy folk, now withdrew ; and, very 
shortly afterward, Camusot senior and the ex-notary 
Cardot, supported by his son-in-law Berthier, were 
the only guests — Pons and Brunner excepted — thac 
remained in the room. The worthy Pons, finding him- 
self quite en famille, 2in6. yielding, as men of feeling 
invariably do yield, to the impulse of the moment, most 
inopportunely thanked the president and Madame de 
Marville for the offer that Cecile had just conveyed to 
him; whereupon Brunner, to whom this annuity, thus 
offered, seemed like a premium, was struck by an Israel- 
itish reflection, and assumed an attitude which betokened 
the more than frigid reverie of the calculator. 

“Whether I come to terms with our friend Brunner 
about my collection, or keep it, the collection, or its 
proceeds, will, in any case, belong to your family,’’ said 


126 


GEEMAN IDEA.” 

Pons, when he had informed his astonished relatives 
that he possessed so large a fortune. 

The over-indulgence of both father and mother 
toward Cecile — the idol of the household — had not 
escaped the observation of Brunner ; neither did the 
favorable change in the bearing of all these ignor- 
amuses toward the man thus promoted from a state 
that was branded with pauperism, to affluence fail to 
impress him ; accordingly, he began to amuse himself, 
by exciting the surprise of these worthy bourgeois^ and 
extorting ejaculations of wonder from their lips. 

“ I told Mademoiselle Cecile that Monsieur Pons’ pic- 
tures were worth that sum to me ; but, having regard to 
the price which all that is unique in art has reached in 
these days, there is no foreseeing how much this col- 
lection might fetch if it were put up for public competi- 
tion. The sixty pictures would sell for a million francs ; 
I saw several that were worth fifty thousand francs 
apiece;” 

“It is a good thing to be your inheritant,” said the 
quondam notary to Pons. 

“But my inheritant is my cousin Cecile,” replied 
Pons, still persisting in his claim to relationship. 

Every one seemed to be seized wdth a sudden 
admiration for the old musician. 

“ She will be a very rich heiress,” said Cardot, 
laughing ; and off he went. 

Camusot, senior, the president, Madame Camusot, 
Cecile, Brunner, Berthier and Pons were now left 
together by the rest of the party ; for it was presumed 
that a formal demand for Cecile’s hand would now be 
made. And, in fact, so soon as the persons just men- 
tioned were alone, Brunner opened fire with an inquiry 
which seemed to Cecile’s relatives to augur well. 


127 


GERMAN IDEA.’^ 

“ I believe I was given to understand,” said Brunner, 
addressing Madame Camusot, “ that Mademoiselle 
Cecile is an only daughter — ” 

Certainly,” replied the lady, proudly. 

“You will meet with no difficulties in any quarter,” 
said the worthy Pons, in order to determine Brunner to 
formulate his request. 

But Brunner suddenly became thoughtful ; a fatal 
silence diffused the strangest chill among the assembled 
group ; had Madame Caijiusot admitted that her little 
daughter was epileptic, things could not have been worse. 
The president, thinking that his daughter was best away, 
made a sign to Cecile, which she interpreted correctly 
by leaving the room. Brunner still remained silent ; 
the persons present began to stare at one another ; and 
the situation became most embarrassing. Thereupon 
Camusot senior (who was a man of experience), guessing 
that some difficulties had supervened, took the German 
into Madame Camusot’s room, under pretense of show- 
ing him the fan which Pons had discovered, and 
motioned to his son, his daughter-in-law, and Pons to 
leave him and Brunner alone together. 

‘‘There is the master-piece!” said the old silk- 
merchant, pointing to the fan. 

“ It is worth five thousand francs,” replied Brunner, 
after having examined it. 

“ Did you not come here, monsieur, with the intention 
of asking for my granddaughter’s hand ?” pursued the 
future peer of France. 

“I did, monsieur,” said Brunner ; “and I entreat you 
to believe that no alliance could be more flattering to 
me than this. I shall never find a young lady hand- 
somer, more amiable, or more to my taste than 
Mademoiselle Cecile ; but — ” 


128 


geeman idea.” 

“ Oh ! no buts^'' said old Camusot ; “ or if there are to 
be any buts^ translate them at once, my dear sir — ” 

Monsieur,” pursued Brunner, seriously, “ I am hear- 
tily glad that there is no engagement on either side ; for 
the quality of being an only daughter — a quality that is 
so valuable in the eyes of every one, except myself — 
forms an insuperable impediment — ” 

“What, sir, ’’broke in the astounded grandfather, “do 
you convert that which is an immense advantage into a 
positive drawback? Your conduct is really so extraor- 
dinary that I should be extremely glad to hear your 
reasons for it.” 

“ Sir,” replied the German, phlegmatically, “ I came 
here, this evening, with the intention of asking Monsieur 
le President for his daughter’s hand ; I wished to insure 
to Mademoiselle Cecile a brilliant future, by offering 
her as much of my fortune as she should be willing to 
accept; but an only daughter is a child who has been 
allowed, through parental indulgence, to do as she 
pleased, and has never known what it is to be thwarted 
in her wishes. This family resembles many families, in 
which I, formerly, had an opportunity of studying the 
worship that is offered to this species of divinity ; not 
only is your granddaughter the idol of the household, 
but it is Madame la Presidente who wears the — you 
know what ! Sir, these eyes of mine have seen my 
father’s home turned into a hell from this very cause ; 
my step-mother — the fountain from which all my mis- 
fortunes flowed — an only daughter, the idol of her par- 
ents, the most charming of brides, turned out an 
incarnate fiend. I haVe no doubt that Mademoiselle 
Cecile is an exception to my general rule ; but I am no 
longer a young man ; I am a man of forty ; and the dis- 
parity of our ages involves difficulties which prevent me 



^4 










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‘‘a german idea.” 129 

from conferring^ happiness on a young lady who is 
accustomed to be obeyed by Madame la Presidente, and 
to whom Madame la Presidente listens as to an oracle. 
By what right could I exact from Mademoiselle Cecile 
an entire change of habits and ideas ? Instead of a 
father and mother, accustomed to bow to her lightest 
caprice, she would find in me an egotistical quadragena- 
rian ; if she resists that egotism, ’tis the quadragenarian 
who will be vanquished. As a man of honor, therefore, 
I withdraw my suit. I desire, moreover, to take upon 
myself all the blame of this rupture ; if, however, it 
should be necessary to explain why I have paid but one 
visit to this house — ” 

“If such, monsieur, be the motives of your conduct,” 
interposed the future peer, “ however singular they may 
appear, they are at least plausible — ” 

“ I beg, monsieur, that you will not cast the slightest 
doubt upon^my sincerity,” replied Brunner, emphatically, 
interrupting Monsieur Camusot. “ If you know of some 
poor girl, one of an overnumerous family, one who, 
though portionless, has been well brought up — and there 
are many such girls in France — I am quite ready to 
marry her, if her disposition be such as to promise me 
happiness.” 

During the silence which succeeded this announce- 
ment, Frederick Brunner quitted Cecile’s grandfather, 
and, having politely taken leave of the president and his 
wife, departed. A living commentary on the parting 
salutation of her Werther, Cecile now reappeared, pale 
as a person at the point of death. Concealed in her 
mother’s wardrobe she had overheard every word that 
had been uttered. 

“Refused,” she murmured in her mother’s ears. 


130 


“ PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 

‘‘ And on what ground demanded Madame Camusot 
of her embarrassed father-in-law. 

“Upon the pretty pretext that only daughters are 
spoiled children,” replied the old man. “ And he is not 
altogether wrong,” added he, embracing this opportunity 
of attacking his daughter-in-law, who had been boring 
him to death for twenty years. 

“ This will kill my daughter ! and you will be her 
murderer !” said Madame Camusot, addressing Pons, 
while she supported her daughter, who thought proper 
to justify her mother’s language by sinking into her 
arms. 

The president and his wife dragged Cecile to an arm- 
chair, where she completed her fainting fit. The grand- 
father rang for the servants. 


CHAPTER XI. 

“ PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 

“ I detect the plot which that gentleman has brewed,’ 
said the furious mother, pointing to Pons. 

At these words. Pons sprung up as if the last trumpet 
had resounded in his ears. 

“ Thac gentleman,” pursued Madame Camusot, whose 
eyes resembled two fountains of green bile, “ that gen- 
tleman has seen fit to revenge a harmless joke with an 
insult. Who will believe that this German is in his 
right mind ? Either he is the accomplice of an atrocious 
act of vengeance, or he is mad. I hope. Monsieur Pons, 
that, for the future, you will spare us the pain of seeing 


PONS BURIED IN GRAVE 


131 


u 


you in a house into which you have endeavored to 
introduce shame and dishonor." 

Pons, who was now changed into a statue, kept his 
eyes fixed upon a rose in the pattern of the carpet, and 
twiddled his thumbs. 

Weil ! you are still there, you monster oi ingratitude !" 
cried Madame Camusot, looking round. “We shall 
never be at home — neither your master nor I — if this 
gentleman should ever call !" she added, speaking to 
the servants, and pointing to Pons. “ Go you, John, 
and fetch the doctor, and you, Madeleine, bring some 
hartshorn, quick !’’ 

In Madame Camusot’s view of the matter, the reasons 
assigned by Brunner were mere pretexts, concealing 
reasons that were unavowed ; but that rendered the 
rupture of the proposed marriage all the more certain. 
With that rapidity of thought which women are wont to 
display in critical emergencies, Madame Camusot had 
hit upon the only feasible plan for retrieving the check 
she had sustained, namely, to charge Pons with an act 
of premeditated revenge. This device — an infernal 
device, so far as Pons was concerned — saved the honor of 
the family. Constant in her hatred of Pons, she had 
clothed a woman’s mere suspicion with the garb of 
absolute truth. Women, for the most part, have a creed 
of their own and a morality of their own ; they believe 
in the objective reality of everything that it suits their 
interests and passions to believe. Madame Camusot, 
however, went a great deal further than that ; she con- 
sumed the whole evening in forcing upon the president 
her own convictions ; and on the morrow, the magistrate 
was thoroughly persuaded of his cousin’s guilt. Now, 
no one will deny that the conduct of Madame Camusot 
was execrable ; yet, there is not a mother, who, in like 


182 PONS BUKIED IN GRAVEL.” 

circumstances, would not act as Madame Camusot acted. 
Every rnother will sacrifice the honor of a stranger to 
that of her own daughter ; the means employed will be 
different ; the result to be achieved will be the same. 

The musician rushed down-stairs with great rapidity ; 
but as he made his way toward the boulevard, and 
thence onward to the theatre, his steps were slow. 
Mechanically he entered the play-house ; mechanically 
he stepped into his place ; mechanically he conducted 
the orchestra. During the entr' acts^ he replied so 
vaguely to the questions addressed to him by Schmucke, 
that Schmucke kept his uneasiness to himself ; for he 
thought that Pons had fairly taken leave of his senses. 
For a man so child-like as Pons was, the scene which 
had just occurred assumed all the dimensions of a catas- 
trophe. To arouse a hideous hate there where he had 
meant to introduce happiness, was a complete subver- 
sion of existence. From the eyes, from the gestures, 
and from the voice of Madame Camusot he had learned 
— at last — that she was his deadly foe. 

On the morrow, Madame Camusot came to a decisive 
resolution, which suited the nature of the case, and was 
indorsed with her husband’s approbation. It was 
resolved that Cecile’s portion should be made to com- 
prise the estate of Marville, the hotel in the Rue de 
Hanovre, and a hundred thousand francs in cash. In 
the course of the morning, Madame Camusot, fully 
understanding that the only mode of repairing such a 
defeat as she had sustained was by a ready-made match, 
went to call upon the Countess Popinot, to whom she 
told the tale of Pons’ frightful vengeance and of the 
terrible hoax that he had. concerted. Everything seemed 
credible when the reason assigned for the breaking off 
of the match was the fact of Cecile’s being an only 


‘‘pons BUKIKD IN GRAVEL.” 133 

daughter. At the close of her harangue, Madame 
Camusot dexterously displayed the advantages of being 
called Popinot de Marville, and the. magnificence of the 
marriage portion. Regard being had to the value of 
landed property in Normandy, and calculating interest 
at two per cent., the estate of Marville represented a 
capital of about nine hundred thousand francs ; and the 
hotel in the Rue de Hanovre was valued at two hundred 
and fifty thousand francs. No reasonable family 
could reject such an alliance ; and, accordingly. Count 
Popinot and his wife accepted it. Then, as having a 
personal interest in the reputation of the family of 
which they were about to form a part, they promised 
to assist in explaining the catastrophe which had 
occurred on the preceding evening. 

So now, in the house of this identical Camusot senior, 
Cecile’s grandfather, and in the presence of those 
indentical persons, who, but a few days before, had been 
gathered together in that very house, and had heard 
from the lips of Madame Camusot the Brunner-litany, 
this same Madame Camusot, whom every one shrunk 
from accosting, boldly anticipated all the difficulties of 
an explanation. 

“ Really,” said she, “ in these days it is impossible to 
take too many precautions when it is a question of mar- 
riage ; and more especially where one has foreigners to 
deal with.” 

“ And why, madame ?” said a lady. 

“ What has happened to you ?” asked Madame Chiffre- 
ville. 

“What? Do you mean to say you haven’t heard of 
our adventure with this fellow, Brunner, who had the 
audacity to aspire to the hand of Cecile ? He is the 


134 ^‘PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 

son of a German tavern-keeper ; his uncle used to sell 
rabbit-skins.” 

“ Is it possible ? And you so prudent !” exclaimed a 
lady. 

“These adventurers are so cunning! But we have 
learned the whole story from Berthier. This German 
has a friend — a poor wretch of a flute-player ! He is on 
intimate terms with a man who keeps a lodging-house 
in the Rue du Mail, and with tailors. We discovered 
that he has led a4ife of the grossest debauchery ; and 
no fortune can suffice for a scamp who has already 
squandered all that he inherited from his mother — ” 

“ Why, your daughter would have led a most miser- 
able life said Madame Berthier. 

“ And how did he contrive to get introduced to you ?” 
inquired the aged Madame Lebas. 

“ Oh, through a bit of revenge, on the part of 
Monsieur Pons ; he, it was, who introduced to us this 
worthy gentleman, in order to make us look ridiculous. 
This Brunner — Brunner, by the bye, means Fountain, 
and they palmed him off upon us as a grand seigneur^ 
forsooth. This Brunner is a man of broken constitu- 
tion, a man with a bald head and bad teeth ; so that to 
see him, even once only, was quite enough to put me 
upon my guard.” 

“ But how about this large fortune that you men- 
tioned ?” said a young woman, timidly. 

“ The fortune is not so large as it is said to be. The 
tailors, the lodging-house keeper, and he, all clubbed 
together, and scraped out their cash-boxes to form a 
bank. What is a bank nowadays — that is to. say, to 
start one ? Why, it is merely a licence to become a 
bankrupt. A woman goes to bed a millionaire, and 
wakes to find herself stripped of everything but her 


“ PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 136 

paraphernalia. Our opinion of this gentleman was 
formed as soon as we heard him speak, nay, directly we 
caught sight of him ; you can tell from his very gloves, 
from his very overcoat, that he is nothing but a common 
workman, whose father kept a German cook-shop ; that 
he is a low-minded fellow, who drinks beer, and smokes 
— (oh ! madame ! would you believe it?) — five-and-twenty 
pipes a day ! What a destiny for my poor Lili ! The 
very thought . of it makes me shudder even now. But 
God preserved us from it ! Besides, Lili had no love 
for the man. Now could we, I ask you, expect such a 
hoax on the part of a relative, of one who was a con-, 
stant visitor at our house, who had been dining with us 
twice a week for the last twenty years ; a man whom 
we have loaded with favors, and who played his part so 
thoroughly that he actually named Cecile as his heir in the 
presence of the keeper of the seals, the attorney-general 
and the first president. This Brunner and Monsieur 
Pons had agreed to represent each other to be million- 
aires. No, I do assure you, all you ladies would have 
been taken in by this artist’s hoax !” 

Within a few weeks after this gathering, the united 
families of Popinot and Camusot and their adherents 
had gained an easy victory in society ; for no one there 
undertook the defense of the wretched Pons, the para- 
site, the sullen schemer, the miser, the pretended good 
fellow, who now laid buried beneath a mountain of con- 
tempt, and was regarded as a viper nursed in the bosom 
of the family — as a man of almost unparelleled de- 
pravity — a dangerous buffoon, whom it was desirable 
entirely to forget. 

About a month after the Werther — who was no 
Werther — had declined the match, poor Pons, just risen 
from a sick-bed, to which he had been confined by a 


136 ^^PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 

nervous fever, was sunning himself along the boule- 
vards, leaning on Schmucke’s arm. None of the loung- 
ers on the Boulevard du Temple laughed at the Pair of 
Nut-Crackers now — the broken aspect of the one and 
the touching solicitude of the other on behalf of his 
convalescent friend were not subjects for ridicule. 

When the two friends had reached the Boulevard 
Poissonniere, Pons had regained a little color through 
breathing the air of the boulevards, which is so bracing ; 
for wherever there is a dense throng of human beings 
the atmosphere is so vitalizing that the exemption from 
mala aria of the noisome Ghetto, which swarms with 
Jews, is notorious at Rome. Perhaps, also, the sight of 
that which had been a source of daily delight to him — 
the grand panorama of Parisian life — exercised a res- 
torative influence on the sick man. The two friends 
were walking arm-in-arm ; but from time to time Pons 
would leave Schmucke’s side to go and examine the 
novelties recently exposed for sale in the shop windows. 
Quitting Schmucke’s arm in front of' the Varieties 
Theatre to make one of these excursions. Pons found 
himself face to face with Count Popinot, whom he 
accosted in the most respectful manner ; for the ex- 
minister was one of those men for whom Pons enter- 
tained the highest respect and esteem. 

“Ah, monsieur!’’ replied the peer of France, with 
great severity, “ I cannot understand how you can be so 
wanting in tact as to salute a person connected with the 
family which you have tried to cover with disgrace and 
ridicule by an act of revenge such as artists well know 
how to devise. Understand, monsieur, that from this 
day forth you and I must be strangers to one another. 
Madame la Comtesse Popinot shares the indignation 


‘^PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 137 

m 

with which your conduct toward the Marvilles has 
inspired the whole circle.” 

Having thus delivered himself, the former minister 
passed on, leaving Pons thunder-struck. The passions. 
Justice and the Government, invariably fail to take into 
consideration the condition of the beings whom they 
punish. The statesman, impelled by family interests to 
annihilate Pons, was blind to the physical weakness of 
^ this formidable foe. 

“What is the madder wid you, my boor friend ?” cried 
Schmucke, turning as pale as Pons himself. 

“I have just received another dagger-thrust in my 
heart,” replied the worthy man, leaning heavily on 
Schmucke’s arm ; “I do believe that it is only the good 
God Himself who has the right to do good ; and that 
that is why all those who meddle with what is His 
business only are so cruelly punished for their con- 
duct.” 

This artist’s sarcasm was a supreme effort on the 
part of this excellent creature, who wished to dissipate 
the terror imprinted on the features of his friend. 

“I belief so too,” replied Schmucke, with simplicity. 

The whole matter was quite incomprehensible to 
Pons, to whom neither the Camusots nor the Popinots 
had sent any invitation to be present at Cecile’s wed- 
ding. On the Boulevard des Italiens he saw M. Cardot 
coming toward him ; but, warned by the allocution of 
the peer of France, Pons took good care not to stop 
this personage, with whom he had dined once a fort- 
night during the past year, and confined himself to 
bowing to M. Cardot ; but the mayor and deputy simply 
looked at Pons with an indignant air, and did not 
return his salutation. 

“Go and ask him what is the grievance that they 


138 “pons buried in gravel.” 

all have against me?” said poor Pons to Scbmucke, 
who knew all the details of the catastrophe which had 
overtaken Pons. 

“Monsire,” said Schmucke to Cardot, astutely, “my 
friend Rons has just regovered from an illness, and no 
doubt you did not regognize him.” 

“ Oh, perfectly,” said Cardot. 

“But what have you to rebroage him wid ?” 

“Your friend is a monster of ingratitude ; and that he 
still lives is only another confirmation of the proverb, 

‘ 111 weeds grow apace.’ The world is quite justified in 
its distrust of artists ; they are as malignant and as mis- 
chievous as monkeys. Your friend has endeavored to 
disgrace his own family, and to blast the reputation of a 
young lady in order to revenge a harmless joke ; I am 
resolved to have nothing more to do with him ; I will 
endeavor to forget that I have ever known him — that 
such a person exists. These sentiments, monsieur, are 
those of all the members of my family and his family, 
and of, those persons who did Monsieur Pons the honor 
to receive him as their guest.” 

“ But, monsire, you are a feazonaple mann ; and iff 
you will allow me, I will egsplain de madder — ” 

“Remain his friend if you have the heart to do so ; 
you are free to do as you please, monsieur ; but do not 
go beyond that, for I deem it my duty to warn you that 
I shall extend my reprobation to those who may attempt 
either to excuse or to defend him.” 

“To chuzdify him?” said Schmucke. 

“Yes; for his conduct is as unjustifiable as it is 
unqualifiable.” And with this repartee the deputy for 
the Seine pursued his path, unwilling to listen to a 
single syllable further. 

When Schmucke had repeated these savage impre- 


“pons buried in gravel.” 139 

cations to poor Pons, the latter said, with a smile : 
“ Well, I have already the two powers of the state 
against me.” 

“ Efferyding is againzt us,” groaned Schmucke. “ Let 
us go away, to afoid meeting any oder beasts.” 

This was the first time in the whole course of his 
lamb-like existence that Schmucke had been known to 
give vent to such an expression. Never, until now, had 
his almost God-like mildness been disturbed ; he would 
have greeted with a smile — an artless smile — any mis- 
fortune that might have happened to himself ; but to 
see his noble Pons, that “ mute inglorious ” Aristides, 
that meek, unmurmuring man of genius, that soul so 
full of the milk of human kindness, that jewel of loving- 
kindness, that heart of purest gold, maltreated, roused 
within him all the indignation of Alceste, and made him 
term his friend’s Amphitryons — beasts ! In a man of his 
pacific disposition, that excitation was equivalent to all 
Orlando’s rage. With wise precaution, Schmucke 
induced Pons to turn back to the Boulevard du Temple, 
whither Pons allowed himself to be led ; for he was now 
in the condition of a combatant who has ceased to count 
the blows that he receives. As chance would have it, 
nothing in the world was to be wanting to the combina- 
tion against the poor musician. The social avalanche 
that overwhelmed him .was to include every element — 
the house of peers, the chamber of deputies, the 
family, the stranger, the strong, the weak, yea, even 
the innocent ! 

As Pons was on his way homeward on the Boulevard 
Poissonniere, he saw coming toward him the daughter 
of this very M. Cardot — a young lady who had suffered 
enough misfortunes to render her indulgent. She had 
made a faiiec-pas that had been kept secret ; and had 


140 PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 

resigned herself to be her husband’s slave. Among all 
the ladies who presided over the houses at which Pons 
dined, Mme. Berthier was the only one whom he called 
by her Christian name ; he addressed her as Felicie ; 
and at times he fancied that she understood him. This 
gentle creature seemed annoyed at meeting her cousin 
Pons — for, as a cousin Pons was treated, in spite of the 
absence of all relationship between him and the family 
of his cousin’s second wife — but being unable to 
avoid him, Felicie Berthier stopped and confronted the 
dying man. 

“I did not think that you were wicked, cousin,” said 
Felicie ; “ but if only one quarter of what I hear said 
about you be true, you must be thoroughly false. Oh ! 
do not attempt to justify yourself,” added she, with 
emphasis, observing Pons’ gesture; “it would be use- 
less for two reasons ; first, because I have forfeited the 
right to condemn, to judge, or to accuse any one, know- 
ing, as I do, from my own case, that those who seem to 
be most completely in the wrong may have excuses to 
offer ; and secondly, because your explanations would 
be unavailing. Monsieur Berthier, who drew up the 
contract of marriage between Mademoiselle de Marville 
and Viscount Popinot, is so indignant with you that if 
he knew that I have spoken even a single word to 
you, that I have addressed you even for the last 
time, he would certainly scold me. Everybody is 
against you.” 

“So I perceive, madame,” replied the poor musician, 
in a voice broken by emotion. Then bowing respect- 
fully to the notary’s wife, he weariedly resumed his 
journey to the Rue de Normandie, leaning so heavily 
upon Schmucke’s arm that, the old German could not 
fail to feel that his friend was making a brave attempt 


“ PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 141 

to bear up against physical exhaustion. This third 
encounter was, as it were, a verdict pronounced by the 
Lamb that reposes at the feet of God ; the wrath of this 
angel of the poor — this symbol of the peoples — is the 
final utterance of Heaven ! After this the two friends 
reached home without exchanging a single word. There 
are certain critical occasions in life when all that we can 
bear is to feel that our friend is near us. Spoken conso- 
lation serves only to irritate the wound by exposing its 
depth. The old pianist possessed, as you may see, 
the genius of friendship ; the delicacy of those who, 
having suffered much, well know the mood of those 
who suffer. 

It was decreed that this should be the last walk that 
the worthy 'Pons should ever take. His original mal- 
ady was immediately succeeded by another. Pons’ 
temperament was of thac kind which is called sanguino- 
bilious ; the bile now passed into his blood ; he was 
attacked by a violent inflammation of the liver. These 
two successive maladies, being the only ailments from 
which Pons had ever suffered, he knew no doctor ; so 
the feeling and devoted Mme. Cibot hit upon an idea 
which in any case would have been excellent, and was, 
in its incipience, even motherly ; she called in the doctor 
of the district. 

There is in every district in Paris a doctor whose 
name and residence are known to the poor, to the small 
shop-keepers, and to the. porters of the vicinity only ; 
and who is, therefore, called the district doctor. This 
doctor, who acts as accoucheur and blood-letter, is the 
“servanc of all work” of the medical profession. The 
district doctor, who cannot choose but be good to the. 
poor and has, by dine of long practice, acquired consid- 
erable skill in his vocation, is generally liked. Dr. 


14:2 “tons buried m gravel.” 

Poulain, having been introduced to the sick-room by 
Mme. Cibot and recognized by Schmucke, lent a care- 
less ear to the complaints of the old musician who 
throughout the night had been scratching his skin, now 
completely callous. The state of the eyes, which were 
surrounded by yellow circles, corresponded with this 
symptom. 

“ You have experienced some violent grief within the 
last two days, have you not ?” said the doctor to his 
patient. 

Alas, yes,” replied Pons. 

“You are suffering from the disorder which that gen- 
tleman so narrowly escaped,” said Poulain, pointing to 
Schmucke. “ I mean the jaundice. But it will be a 
mere trifle,” he added, as he proceeded to write a pre- 
scription. Notwithstanding this last most reassuring 
phrase, the doctor had cast at his patient one of those 
Hippocratean glances in which a sentence of death 
(veiled though it may be by conventional sympathy) 
may always be read by the eyes of those who are inter- 
ested in knowing the truth. Mme. Cibot, accordingly, 
who scrutinized the doctor’s glance with all the keen 
penetration of a spy, was not deceived by the tone in 
which his remark was uttered, nor by the hypocritical 
mask that he assumed ; she therefore followed Dr. 
Poulain when he went away, and when they had reached 
the landing, inquired : 

“ Do you really think it will be a mere trifle ?” 

“ My dear Madame Cibot, your patient is a dead man ; 
not on account of the invasion of the bile into the blood, 
but on account of his moral prostration. However, with 
a great deal of care, the patient may yet recover ; he 
should be got away from here and taken for a trip — ” 
“And where is the money to come from ?’* inquired 


“ PONS BURIED IN GRAVEL.” 143 

the portress. “ All he has is his berth ; and his friend 
lives upon a small allowance from certain grand ladies 
to whom he’s been of some service, according to his 
own account — some very charitable ladies. It’s just two 
children as I’ve been looking after these nine years.” 

“My life is spent in attending people who die — not 
from their illnesses, but from that great and incurable 
disease, the want of money. In how many a garret am 
I compelled, far from exacting payment for my visit, to 
leave half a crown upon the chimney-piece !” 

“ Poor, dear Monsieur Poulain !” exclaimed Mme. 
Cibot. “ Ah, if you only had a hundred thousand francs 
a year, like certain screws in this quarter, who n’are just 
so many devils let loose from hell, you’d be the agent of 
the good God here n’on earth !” 

The doctor, who, thanks to the good-will of those 
worthy gentlemen, the porters of his arrondissement, 
had succeeded in getting together a little connection 
which brought him barely enough to live upon, here 
raised his eyes to heaven and thanked Mme. Cibot by a 
grimace worthy of Tartuffe himself. 

“You say, then, my dear Monsieur Poulain, that with 
great care our dear patient may pull round ?” 

“Yes ; unless the inner man has sustained too severe 
a shock from the grief he has undergone.” 

“ Poor man ! who could have caused hun grief ? He’s 
a brave fellow, who n’hasn’t his like on earth, except his 
friend. Monsieur Schmucke ! I’ll find n’out what has 
brought him to this pass ; and I warrant I gives a good 
dressing to the folks who’ve been and riled my gentlema?t." 

“ Listen to me, my dear Madame Cibot,” said the doc- 
tor, who was now standing on the step of the carriage- 
gate ; “one of the principal features of the disease from 
which your ‘gentleman’ is suffering is a constant irrita- 


144 “pons buried in gravel.” 

bility over trifles ; and as it is not probable that he can 
call in a nurse, you will have to look after him yourself. 
So you understand ?” 

‘‘ Ish it about Moshieur Ponsh shat you are shpeaking ?” 
asked the dealer in old iron, who was engaged in smok- 
ing his pipe, and now, as he uttered the question, rose 
from the stone on which he was sitting to join in the 
conversation of the portress and her husband. 

“Yes, Daddy Remonencq,” replied Mme. Cibot to the 
Auvergnat. 

“ Well, shen ! he ish ricsher than Moshieur Monishtrol, 
and she lordsh of she curioshitiesh. I knowsh enough 
about art to tell you shat she dear man hash 
treasshures !” 

“Well," said Mme. Cibot to Remonencq, “I thought 
you was a-laughing at me the other day when I showed 
you all those antiqualities ^ while my gentlemen were out." 

At Paris, where the very paving-stones have ears, 
where every door has a tongue, where the window-bars 
have eyes, nothing is more dangerous than a conversa- 
tion in front of a carriage-gate. The parting words 
there uttered, which are to the preceding conversation 
what the postscript is to a letter, are sure to contain 
avowals that are fraught with danger alike to those who 
make, and to those who overhear them. 

A single illustration of this truth may serve to 
corroborate that which this history presents. 


145 


“gold is a chimeka/* 


CHAPTER XII. 

“ GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” (wORDS BY M. SCRIBE, MUSIC BY 
MEYERBEER, SCENERY BY REMONENCQ.) 

One of the most celebrated hair-dressers of the 
imperial epoch — an epoch during which men devoted a 
great deal- of attention to the hair and its arrangement 
— was one day leaving a certain house wherein he had 
just been dressing the hair of a pretty woman, and of 
which all the principal occupants gave him their support. 
Among these there was a certain old bachelor, armed 
with a — housekeeper who hated the lawful heirs of her 
master. A consultation of the most famous physicians 
of the day — who were not as yet called X.\\q princes of 
the science — had just been held over the case of the 
ci-devant young man who was seriously ill. It so hap- 
pened that the doctors and the hair-dresser left the 
house at the very same moment ; and that the doctors, 
halting on the step of the carriage-gate, began to chat- 
ter to each other, as they do when the consultation farce 
is over ; that is to say, in all scientific sincerity and 
truth. “ He is a dead man,” said Dr. Haudry. “ Mira- 
cles apart, he has not a month to live,” replied Desplein. 
These words the barber overheard. 

Now this barber, like all other barbers, kept a good- 
understanding with the servants of his employers. 
Spurred by an exorbitant desire to grow rich, he imme- 
diately returns to the apartments of the ci-devant young 
man, and promises the servant-mistress a handsome 
premium if she can persuade her master to sink a large 


146 ^^GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” 

part of his fortune in an annuity. Now the moribund 
old bachelor, who was fifty-six according to the calendar, 
but twice that age, regard being had to his amorous 
campaigns, possessed, among other property, a magnifi- 
cent mansion situated in the Rue Richelieu, and then 
worth two hundred and fifty thousand francs. This 
mansion — the object of the barber’s greed — was sold to 
him in consideration of an annuity of thirty thousand 
francs. 

The transaction in question occurred in 1806. In 1846 
the barber — who has now retired and is seventy years of 
age — is still paying the annuity. Now, seeing that the 
ci-devant young man is at present ninety-six, is in his 
dotage, and has married his Mme. Everard, he may 
remain upon his legs a long time yet ; and since the 
barber gave something like thirty thousand francs to the 
aforesaid lady, the house has stood him in more than a 
million francs ; but it is now worth from eight to nine 
hundred thousand francs. 

Remonencq, like this barber, had overheard the last 
words addressed to Pons by Brunner upon the gate-step 
on the day when that phenix of suitors had his first 
interview with Cecile ; and these last words had filled 
the Auvergnat with a desire to penetrate into the Pons 
Museum. Being on good terms with the Cibots, it was 
not long ere he was introduced into the rooms of the 
two friends during their absence. Dazzled by so much 
wealth, Remonencq saw that there was “ a stroke of 
business to be done ” — which is dealer’s slang for “ a for- 
tune to be stolen ” — and he had been pondering over the 
matter for five or six days. 

“ I am sho much in earnesht,” said he to Mme. Cibot 
and Dr. Poulain, “zhat we will talk she matter over, 
and if zish good shentlemansh wansh an annuishy of 


147 


‘‘gold is a chimera.” 

fifty thousandsh francshs, I will give you a hamper of 
ordinary winesh, if you will — ” 

“ What can you be thinking about ?” said the doctor 
to Remonencq. “ An annuity of fifty thousand francs ! 
But if the worthy man is so rich and is attended by me 
and nursed by Madame Cibot, why, he may recover — 
for liver complaints are the concomitant drawbacks of 
very strong constitutions — ” 

“Did I shay fifty Why, a shentlemansh — zhare on 
zhe very shtep of your gate — offered him sheven hun- 
dred shousand francsh, and for zhe picturesh onf;-— ^ 
fouchtra !” 

When Mme. Cibot heard this declaration of Remon* 
encq’s she looked at Dr. PoiTlain with a very strange 
expression on her face ; the devil was kindling a sinister 
flame in those orange-colored eyes of hers. 

“Come, don’t let’s listen to such idle tales,’’ resumed 
the doctor, who was very glad to learn that his patient 
was able to pay him for the visits he was about to make. 

“ Monsheur le docteure, if my dear Madame Shibot, 
shinsh zhe shentlemans ish in bed, will allow me. to 
bring my exshpert, I am sure to find zhe money in two 
hoursh time, even if it ish a question of sheven hundred 
shousand francsh — ” 

“ All right, my friend,” replied the doctor. “ Come, 
Madame Cibot, take good care not to exasperate the 
patient ; you must put on your armor of patience ; for 
everything will irritate and weary him — even your 
attentions. You must be prepared to find him grum- 
bling at everything.” 

“ He will be very hard to please if he does,” said the 
portress, 

“ Now, mark well .what I say,” p’.:rsued the doctor, 
authoritatively, “ The life of Monsieur Pons is in the 


148 “ GOLD IS A CHIMERA.’’ 

hands of those who have the care of him. So I shall 
come to see him perhaps twice a day ; I shall commence 
my founds with him — ” 

The doctor had suddenly passed from the supreme 
indifference with which he regarded the fate of his 
pauper patients to the most tender solicitude. The 
earnestness of the speculator had impressed him with 
the idea that this fortune might be a reality. 

“ He shall be waited on like a king,” replied Mme. 
Cibot, with factitious enthusiasm. 

The portress waited until the doctor had turned into 
the Rue Chariot ere she resumed the conversation with 
Remonencq. The old-iron dealer meanwhile was finish- 
ing his pipe, with his back leaning against the jamb of 
his shop-door. He had not taken up this position unde- 
signedly. He wanted the portress to come to him. 

This shop, which had formerly been used as a 
had undergone no alteration since the Auvergnat had 
taken it on lease. The words CAFE DE NOR- 
MANDIE were still legible on the long entablature 
which surmounts the glass frontage of all modern shops. 
The Auvergnat had got some house-decorator’s appren- 
tice to paint (gratis, no doubt) the words : Remonencq., 
ferrailleur., achate les marchandises , d* occasion, in the space 
left beneath the words CAFE DE NORMANDIE. 
As a matter of course, the mirrors, tables, stools, what- 
nots, and all the furniture of the Cafe de Normandie 
had been sold. Remonencq had hired, at an outlay of 
six hundred francs, the bare shop, the back parlor, the 
kitchen, and, on the mezzanine floor, a single room that 
had once been the bedroom of the head-waiter at the 
cafd. The other rooms belonging to the cafd now 
formed part of. a separate letting. The only vestiges of 
the original splendor of the cafd were a plain light green 


^^GOLD IS A CHIMERA.’’ 149 

paper in the shop, and the strong iron bars of the shop- 
front with their bolts. 

When Remonencq first came to the place in 1831, after 
the Revolution of July, he started with a display of 
cracked bells, chipped dishes, old iron, superannuated 
scales, and ancient weights, rendered obsolete by the law 
establishing new weights and measures — a law which 
only the State itself infringes ; for it sanctions the 
circulation of one-sou and two-sou pieces coined in the 
reign of Louis XVI. Then this Auvergnat, of five 
Auvergnat power, began to purchase kitchen ranges, old 
picture-frames, old bits of copper and chipped porcelain. 
Gradually, by dint of filling and emptying and filling 
and emptying again, the shop began to bear a close 
resemblance to Nicolet’s farces ; the character of its 
contents improved. 

The wonderful and infallible scheme adopted by the 
dealer in old iron — a scheme whose results are patent to 
the eyes of any lounger sufficiently philosophical to note 
the arithmetical progression in value of the wares with 
which these intelligent shops are stocked — was this ; 
tin,'argand lamps and earthenware give place to picture- 
frames and copper ; these again make way for porcelain ; 
then, speedily, the shop, that for a brief space figured 
as a daubeum^ is metamorphosed into a museum. At 
last, some fine day the grimy windows are cleaned, the 
interior of the shop is renovated, the Auvergnat doffs 
his velvet and his vests, and sports a frock-coat! There 
is he to be seen, looking like a dragon guarding his 
treasure. He is surrounded by masterpieces ; he has 
developed into a subtle connoisseur; he has decupled 
his capital ; he is not to be taken in by any artifice ; he 
is perfectly familiar with all the tricks of the trade. 
There sits the monster like some old dowager surrounded 


150 ‘‘ GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” 

by a bevy of pretty girls, whom she is offering to the 
highest bidder in the matrimonial market! The beau- 
ties, the miracles of art, make no impression whatever on 
this man, who is, at the same time, coarse and subtle ; who 
bullies the ignorant while calculating what he can make 
out of them. Turned comedian, he affects a passion for 
his pictures and marquetries, or pretends to be poor, or 
invents fictitious purchase prices and offers to show 
(imaginary) sale notes. He is a very Proteus ; in the 
course of one brief hour he is Jocrisse, Janot, Clown, 
Mondor, Harpagon, or Nicodemus. 

At the beginning of the fourth year after his installa- 
tion, Remonencq’s shop contained some valuable time- 
pieces, suits of armor, and old pictures, which were 
protected, when Remonencq himself was away, by his 
sister, a stout ugly woman, who, in answer to her broth- 
er’s summons, had traveled from Auvergne on foot. 
This sister. La Remonencq (a sort of idiot, with vacant 
gaze, and dressed like a Japanese idol), never abated a 
single centime of the prices fixed by her brother. She 
attended to the household duties also, and solved the 
apparently insoluble problem — how to live upon the 
fogs of the Seine. Remonencq and his sister subsisted 
upon bread and herrings, potato peelings and scraps of 
vegetables, picked up from the heaps of refuse left by 
the eating-house keepers near the posts outside their 
doors. Bread included, the brother and sister lived on 
less than sixpence a day ; and that sixpence La Re- 
monencq earned with her needle and spinning-wheel. 

Such was the origin of the business of Remonencq, 
who had first come to Paris as a commissionaire, and 
from 1825 to 1831 had executed the commissions of the 
curiosity-dealers of the Boulevard Beaumarchais and the 
coppersmiths of the Rue de Lappe. And such is the 


“ GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” 151 

normal history of many a dealer in curiosities. The 
Jews, the men of Normandy, of Auvergne and of Savoy 
— four distinct races — have (one and all) the same 
instincts, and adopt the same means of growing rich. 
To spend nothing, to be content with small profits, and 
to pile interest on profit — that is their charter ; and their 
charter is more than a mere name. 

Remonencq, now reconciled with his former employer, 
Monistrol, whose trade was with the wholesale dealers, 
was now accustomed to chiner — that is the technical 
word — in the precinct of Paris, which, as is well known, 
comprises an area of forty leagues. After being in busi- 
ness for fourteen years he possessed a capital of sixty 
thousand francs, besides a well-stocked shop. Having 
no chance custom in the Rue de Normandie, a spot to 
which he clung on account of the lowness of his rent, he 
sold his wares to the dealers, contenting himself with 
moderate profits. All his business was transacted in the 
Auvergne dialect, known by the name of charabia. Re- 
monencq indulged in a day-dream ! His day-dream 
was — to have a shop upon the boulevard. He wanted 
to become a rich curiosity-dealer, so that he might, some 
day, sell direct to the amateurs. He was, moreover, a 
formidable man of business. His face was almost 
impenetrable ; for, in the first place, it was covered^ — in 
consequence of his being his own journeyman — with a 
thick coating composed of iron filings and perspiration ; 
and, in the second, habitual hard work had given to his 
features that stoical impassiveness which distinguishes 
the veterans of the year 1799. Physically, Remonencq 
was a short, thin man, whose little, cold blue eyes were 
placed in his head like those of a pig, and betokened the 
concentrated avarice and crafty cunning of the, Jew 


152 “gold is a chimera.” 

without that superficial humility which conceals his pro- 
found contempt for the Christian. 

The relations subsisting between the Cibots and the 
Remonencqs were those of the obliger and the obliged. 
Madame Cibot, who implicitly believed that the two 
Auvergnats were exceedingly poor, sold them the leav- 
ings of Schmucke and Cibot at prices fabulously low. 
The Remonencqs paid her two centimes and a half fora 
pound of dry crusts and bread-crumbs, one centime and 
a half for a porringer full of potatoes, and so on in pro- 
portion. The wily Remonencq was never supposed to 
do any business on his own account ; he always pre- 
tended that he was merely Monistrol’s agent, and com- 
plained that the wealthy dealers barely allowed him to 
exist ; so the Cibots sincerely pitied the Remonencqs. 
After eleven years wear, the velvet jacket, velvet waist- 
coat, and velvet trousers of the Auvergnat still held 
together ; but these three garments, which are charac- 
teristic of the men of Avergne, were covered with 
patches, inserted, gratuitously, by Cibot. It is clear that 
all the Jews are not in Israel. 

“Aren’t you making game of me, Remonencq?” said 
the portress. “ Is it possible as Monsieur Pons can 
have so large a fortune and lead the life he leads ? 
Why, he hasn’t a hundred francs about him !” 

“Amateursh are alwaysh like that,” replied Remo- 
nencq, sententiously. 

“ So you really n’and truly believe as my gentleman 
has seven hundred thousand francs worth of — ” 

“ Yesh, in picturesh alone — he hash one, which, if he 
wanted fifty shoushand francshs for it, I would find 
shem, if I had to shtrangle myshelf for shem. You 
know well zhe little framesh of enameled copper full of 
red velvet in which zhere are portraitsh. Well, zhen, 


GOLD xe A CHIMERA 


153 




» 


zhey are enamelsh by Pettitotte, which moncheir, zhe 
minishter of zhe Government, who wash a druggisht, 
would give three shoushand francshs apiecsh — ” 

“ There are thirty of them in the two frames !" 
exclaimed the portress, with dilating eyes. 

“ Well, shell judgesh of his treashure !” 

Madame Cibot, seized with vertigo, turned right-about- 
face. In a moment, the idea of being remembered in 
Pons’ will, of being placed on an equal footing with all 
the servant-mistresses, whose annuities had excited so 
much cupidity throughout the Marais, sprung up in her 
mind. She pictured herself living in one of the 
communes on the outskirts of Paris ; flaunting it in a 
villa ; looking after her poultry and her garden ; and 
spending her declining years in regal state ; she and her 
poor Cibot, who, like all neglected and uncomprehended 
angels, deserved so much happiness. 

In the abrupt and native right-about-face movement 
of the portress, Remonencq read the certain success of 
his scheme. The principal difficulty to be surmounted 
by the chineur^ is the difficulty of gaining admission to 
the houses containing the treasures that he is in search 
of ; for the chineur is a man who is on the lookout for 
opportunities. (Chineur is derived from the verb chiner 
— to go in search of. anything that may turn up, and 
conclude advantageous bargains with ignorant owners.) 
No one would credit the number of tricks a la Scapin, 
of Sganarelle dodges, of Dorine-like allurements played 
'off or brought to bear by the chineur in order to effect 
an entrance into the houses of the gentry. They are 
genuine comedies fit for the stage, and their basis always 
is, as in this case, the rapacity of servants. For thirty 
francs in money, or money’s worth, the servant will bring 
about a bargain, out of which the chineur will realize a 


154 ‘^GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” 

profit of one or two thousand francs. The history of 
the acquisition of such and such a service of old Sevres 
(pats tendre) would exhibit the chineur surpassing the 
Congress of Munster in diplomatic artifice, and the Con- 
ventions of Nimeguen, Utrecht, Ryswick and Vienna in 
the exercise of intelligence. Then, the acting of the 
chineur \s much more frank than that of the diplomatist ; 
while, for probing all the profoundest depths of self- 
interest, the former has at his command means quite as 
effective as those that embassadors are at so much pains 
to invent in order to bring about the rupture of the most 
closely cemented alliances. 

“I have shtirred up Dame Shibot and no mishtake,” 
said Remonencq to his sister, as he saw her resuming 
her seat upon a chair which had parted with every scrap 
of its original straw ; “ and now I will go and conshult 
zhe only pershon who undershtandsh zhe matter — our 
Chew, our good Chew who lent ush money at only 
fifteen per shent !” 

Remonencq had read the inmost thoughts of Madame 
Cibot. With women of her stamp to 7£//7/is to act. They 
shrink from nothing that may conduce to the success of 
their plans ; in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, 
they pass from the strictest probity to depravity the most 
profound. Integrity, moreover (like all our other quali- 
ties), is of two kinds ; there is a negative integrity and 
a positive integrity. The integrity of a Madame Cibot 
is of the negative kind ; such persons are upright until 
they have an opportunity of becoming rich. Positive 
integrity is that which is always knee-deep in tempta- 
tion, and never succumbs : such is the integrity of the 
cashier. Through the sluice that had been opened by 
the Belial-like harangue of the dealer in old iron, a flood 
of bad designs rushed into the brain and into the heart 


155 


GOLD IS A OHIMEKA.” 

of this portress. Mounting, or rather — to use the exact 
word — flying, from the lodge to the apartments of her 
“ two gentlemen,” Dame Cibot made her appearance, 
with a hypocritical expression of pity on her face, at 
the threshold of the room in which Pons and Schmucke 
were moaning in concert. When the latter saw the 
housekeeper come in, he motioned to her not to breathe, 
in the presence of the sick man, a single syllable of the 
doctor’s real opinion ; for the friend, the excellent 
German, had read the expression of the doctor’s eye. 
Madame Gibot replied to -Schmucke’s gesture by a 
motion of the head that was meant to indicate the deep- 
est sorrow. 

“Well, my dear sir, and how do you find yourself?” 
inquired the dame. 

So saying, the portress placed herself at the foot of 
the bed, with her arms akimbo, and her eyes fixed lov- 
ingly upon the invalid ; but, oh ! what golden scintilla- 
tions gleamed in those orbs ! To the eye of an observer, 
the glance of a tiger could not have been more terrible. 

“Oh ! I am very bad !” replied poor Pons ; “ I don’t 
feel the slightest desire to eat. Oh ! the world ! the 
world !” cried he squeezing the hand of Schmucke, who, 
seated at the bed’s head, was holding Pons’ hand in his, 
and doubtless listening to an account of the origin of 
Pons’ illness. 

“Ah ! my dear Schmucke, how much better would it 
have been if I had followed your advice, dined here 
every day since we foregathered, and given up this 
society which is now crushing me, as a dung-cart crushes 
an egg — and for what reason ?” 

“ Come, come, my dear sir, no complaints,” said 
Madame Cibot ; “ the doctor has told me the truth.” 

Here Schmucke gave a tug at the portress’ gown. 


156 ‘^GOLD IS A CHIMERA.” 

“ Well ! you may get over it, if you are well looked 
after. Make your mind easy ; you have a good friend 
by your side ; and, without wishing to brag, a woman 
as’ll take n’as much care n’of you as a mother takes of 
her first baby. I pulled Cibot through an illness, when 
Monsieur Poulain had given him up, and had thrown — 
as the saying is — the sheet over his nose, and he had 
been left for dead. Well, you, who n’haven’t come to 
that pass yet, thank God ! — though you n’are bad 
enough, to be sure — you just trust to me; I’ll pull you 
through, without any one’s help. Now do be quiet ; 
don’t toss yourself about like that.” So saying, she 
drew the bedclothes over the hands of the invalid. 
“Come, my little man,” pursued she, “Monsieur 
Schmucke and me’ll pass the night there, at your pillow. 
You will be better cared for than a prince, n’and — 
besides — you are rich enough not to stint yourself of 
anything that your disorder requires. I’ve come to an 
arrangement with Cibot, which — poor dear man ! what 
on earth would he do without me ? — well. I’ve made him 
listen to reason, and we n’are, both of us, so fond of you 
that he’s given me leave to spend the night here — and, 
for a man like him, that’s no slight sacrifice, look you ! 
for he loves me now as much as ever he did the first day 
we were married. I don’t know how it is ; it must be 
the lodge ; both of us always side by side ! Now don’t 
uncover yourself like that,” she exclaimed, darting to 
the head of the bed, and drawing the clothes over Pons’ 
chest. “If you don’t behave well and do whatever 
Monsieur Poulain orders — for Monsieur Poulain’s the 
very image of the good God upon earth, do you 
see ? — I’ll have nothing more to do with you ; you 7nust 
obey me.” 

“Yes, Montame Zibod, he will opey you,” interposed 


GOLD IS A CHIMEKA. 


157 


u 


JJ 


Schmucke ; “ for he wants to liff, for de zake of his goot 
friend Sclimucke, I warrant him.” 

“Above all things, don’t irritate yourself,” said 
Madame Cibot ; “for your disease will make you 
n’irritable enough in all conscience without your mak- 
ing matters worse. God sends us our afflictions, my 
dear good sir ; He punishes us for our faults ; you’ve 
got some sweet little faults to reproach yourself with, 
no doubt !” (Here the sick man shook his head.) “Oh, 
come ! come ! you must have been n’in love when you 
was young ; you’ve had your frolics ; perhaps the fruit 
of your passion may be knocking about somewhere or 
other now, without fire, food or home — you men are 
such monsters ! one day all love, and then — frist I — 
all’s over — no more thought for anything ; no, not 
even while the child’s at the breast ! Alas, for us 
poor women !” 

“ But no one, except Schmucke, and my poor mother, 
ever loved said poor Pons, disconsolately. 

“ Oh ! come now, come now, you ain’t a saint, you 
know ! You was young once, and you must have been 
n’a very good-looking young fellow in your time. 
When you was twenty — considering how good you are 
— / should have been n’in love with you myself !” 

“ I was always as ugly as a toad !” said Pons, in 
sheer despair. 

“ Oh ! it’s your modesty as makes you say that ; 
for I must say you n’have that in your favor ; you 
n^are modest !” 

“No, no, my dear Madame Cibot; I tell you once 
more, I was always ugly ; I have never been loved — ” 

“And you want to make me believe that, do you.'*” 
said the portress. “You want to make me believe at 
this time of day, that, at your n’age, you n’are as spotless 


158 


GOLD IS A CHIMERA.’’ 

as the pattern girl of the village ! Tell that to the 
marines ! You, n’a musician ! a theatre man ! Why, 
if a woman were to tell me so, I wouldn’t believe her — 
that I wouldn’t !” 

“ Montame Zibod ! Montame Zibod ! you will egzaz- 
berate him,” cried Schmucke, seeing that Pons was 
twisting and wriggling about in his bed like a worm. 

“ Hold your tongue, you n’also,’- cried Madame Cibot. 
“ You n’are a pair of old rakes. Plain as you may be, 
both of you, there’s no lid so poor but finds its pot ! as 
the proverb says. Cibot managed to find his way into 
the good graces of one of the prettiest oyster-girls in 
Paris — you n’are a deal better-looking than Cibot — and 
then you n’are such a good soul ; come now, you’ve 
played your little pranks in your time, and God 
is punishing you for forsaking your children, like 
Abraham — ” 

Here the exhausted sufferer found strength to make 
another gesture of dissent. 

“ But make your mind easy ; you may live as long as 
Methuselah, for all that.” 

“ Oh ! leave me alone, leave me alone !” cried Pons. 
“ I have never known what it is to be loved. I never 
had a child ; I am alone in the world.” 

“ Really and truly, now ?” said the portress ; “ for you 
are so kind-hearted that the women — who love a kind 
heart, mind you, that’s what wins 'em — well, it did seem 
to me impossible that in your best days — ” 

“Take her away,” whispered Pons to Schmucke; 
“ she jars my nerves !” 

“ Ah ! well then. Monsieur Schmucke has some chil- 
dren, I’ll be bound, you n’are all alike, you old 
bachelors — ” 


159 


“ A TREATISE.” 

“//” cried Schmucke, springing to his feet, “ // — 
why — *' 

“ What, do you mean to say that you also have got 
neither kith nor kin? Why, you two must have come 
into the world just like a couple of mushrooms." 

“ Come now, come along with me," replied Schmucke ; 
and, suiting the action to the word, he heroically put 
his arm round Madame Cibot’s waist, and, heedless of 
her cries, walked her off into the saloon. 


CHAPTER XIII. 

“ A TREATISE ON THE OCCULT SCIENCES." 

“ What, would you take advantage of a poor woman 
at your time of life ?" cried Madame Cibot, struggling 
in Schmucke’s arms. 

“ Don’t shout !" said Schmucke. 

You, the best of the two !" continued Madame Cibot. 
“ Ah ! I did wrong to talk about love to two n’old men 
who have never been n’in love. I’ve been and roused 
your passions, you monster !’’ she cried, catching the 
glare of anger in Schmucke’s eyes. “To the rescue ! 
To the rescue ! I’m being carried off !" 

“ You are a vool," said the German. “ Come now, 
dell me what did de doctor zay ?" 

“You treat me in this brutal fashion," said Dame 
Cibot, weeping, but restored to liberty, “ me as would 
go through fire and water to serve you two gentlemen ! 
Ah, well ! They say that we come to know what men 
are by n’experience — how true that is ! My poor Cibot 


160 


‘‘a treatise.” 

would never serve me in this fashion. And me, too, 
a treating you as if you was my own children ; for I’ve no 
children of my own, and it was only yesterday, as I was 
a-sayingto Cibot : ‘ My friend, God knew well what He 
was about in denying us children, for I’ve two children 
up there.’ There now, by the holy Cross of God, upon 
my mother’s soul, those were my very words — ” 

“Yes, yes, but what did the doctor say persisted 
Schmucke, furiously ; and, for the first time in his life, 
he stamped his foot. 

“ Oh !” replied Madame Cibot, drawing Schmucke 
into the dining-room, “ he said that our dearly beloved 
duck of a love of an n’invalid would be in great danger 
of dying unless he was well nursed ; but I’m here, in 
spite of your brutality — for brutal you rC are — and so I 
tell you, youy whom I took to be so gentle. So that’s 
your disposition, is it? You’d take advantage of a 
woman, at your time of life, would you, you big rascal?” 

“/a rasgal ? Don’t you know dat I Ioffe no one put 
Rons ?” 

“ Well and good ; then you’ll leave me alone, won’t 
you?” said the dame, smiling at Schmucke. “You’d 
better, for Cibot would break all the bones in any one’s 
body as tried to take liberties with me.” 

“Nurse Rons well, my leetle Montame Zibod,” 
returned Schmucke, trying to get hold of Madame 
Cibot’s hand. 

“Ah ! you would, would you, again ?” 

“ Now lizzen to me ; all dat I have shall be yours, if 
we zave him.” 

“Very well, I’m going to the apothecary’s to get 
what’s wanted — for look’ee here, sir, this illness ’ll cost 
money ; and how n’are you going to manage ?” 



w 

ELIE MAGUS DUSTING HIS PICTURES— -See Page 178 . 



“ A TREATISE.” 161 

“I vilJ vork ; I zhould like Bons to be nursed like a 
prinze.” 

And so he shall, my dear Monsieur Schmucke ; and, 
look you, don’t worry yourself about anything ; Cibot 
and I have got two thousand francs laid by ; you’re 
welcome to them ; I have been spending money of my 
own on you two for a long time past — there T 

“ Egzellent woman !” cried Schmucke, wiping his 
eyes ; “ what a heart she has !” 

“ Dry those tears, which do me proud, for that is my 
recompense,” said Dame Cibot, melodramatically. “ I 
am the most disinterested creature in the world ; but 
don’t ye go into the room with tears in your eyes ; for 
that would make Monsieur Pons believe that he’s worse 
nor he really is.” 

Schmucke, who was touched by this proof of delicacy, 
now at last succeeded in getting hold of Madame Cibot’s 
hand and wrung it. 

“ Spare me !” said the quondam oyster-girl, with a 
tender glance at Schmucke. 

“ Bons,” said the worthy German, when he had regained 
the bedroom, “ Montame Zibod is ein angel ; she is a 
dalkadive angel, I admid ; but still she is ein angel.” 

“You think so, do you — I have grown suspicious, 
this last month,” replied the invalid, shaking his head. 
“ After so many mishaps as I have had, one ceases to 
believe, except in God and you !” 

“ Ged well, and we will all tree liff like gings,” said 
Schmucke. 

“ Cibot,” said the portress to her husband, as, panting 
for breath, she, entered the lodge. “ Ah ! my friend, 
our fortune is made. My two gentlemen have no heirs, 
no love-children, no nothing ; what do you say to that ? 


162 


A TREATISE. 


a 


» 


Oh ! ril go to Madame Fontaine’s and have my fortune 
told ; so as we may know what our income will be !” 

“ Wife,” said the little tailor, “ it’s ill waiting for a 
dead man’s shoes.” 

“ Ah ! you want to torment me, do you ?” said the 
dame, giving Cibot a friendly tap. “ I knows what I 
know ! Monsieur Poulain has given Monsieur Pons up ! 
and we shall be rich ; my name will be mentioned in the 
will ; ril take my oath of it. Ply your needle, and look 
after your lodge — you won’t have to do that sort of work 
very much longer ! We’ll retire into the country ; we’ll 
go and live at Batignolles. N’a nice house, n’a nice 
garden, as you’ll amuse yourself by looking after ; n’Pll 
have a servant to wait upon me !” 

“ Well, neighbor, and how are shings going on up 
yonder?” inquired Remonencq. “Do you know what 
zhe collection ish worth ?” 

“ No, no, not yet. I don’t go that way to work, my 
good fellow. I began by finding out more n’important 
things than that — ” 

“More important shings shan shat?” ejaculated 
Remonencq. “ What can be more important shan shat ?” 

“ Come, come, my imp, leave me to steer my own 
boat,” said the portress, authoritatively. 

“ But sho mush per shent on this sheven hundred 
shousand francsh, and you would have enough to keep 
you in idlenessh for zhe resht of you daysh !” 

“Make your mind easy. Daddy Remonencq ; when it 
is necessary to know what all the things the old fellow 
has got together are worth, we will see — ” 

The portress, after having gone to the druggist’s to 
get the medicine ordered by Doctor Poulain, put off her 
consultation with Madame Fontaine until the morrow, 
thinking that she would find the faculties of the oracles 


A TREATISE.” 


168 


fresher and brighter if she paid her visit the first thing 
in the morning before any one else was there — for there 
is often quite a crowd of people at Madame Fon- 
taine’s. 

After having been, during a period of forty years, the 
rival of the celebrated Mademoiselle Lenormand, whom 
she survived, Madame Fontaine was now the oracle of 
the Marais. It is now easy to conceive what the fortune- 
teller is to the lower classes of Paris, or how vast is the 
influence she exercises over the conduct of the unedu- 
cated ; for cooks, portresses, working-men, all those 
denizens of the French metropolis who live upon hope, 
are in the habit of consulting those privileged beings 
who possess the strange and unexplained power of read- 
ing the future. Faith in the occult sciences is much 
more widely diffused than men of science, advocates, 
notaries, doctors, magistrates and philosophers imagine. 
Some popular instincts are indelible. Of these, that 
instinct which has been so stupidly termed superstition, 
is in the very blood of the people, just as it is in the 
minds of their superiors. There are in Paris several 
statesmen who consult fortune-tellers. To the skeptical, 
judicial astrology — a queer colligation of words by the 
bye — is nothing more or less than the taking advantage 
of an innate feeling, which is one of the strongest of all 
human feelings — curiosity. The skeptic, then, entirely 
denies the existence of any relation whatever between the 
destiny of an individual and the configuration of that 
destiny yielded by the seven or eight principal methods 
which judicial astrology comprises. But the occult 
sciences have shared the fate of the numerous natural 
phenomena that freethinkers and materialist philoso- 
phers, or, in other words, those who recognize nothing 
but solid and tangible facts, the outcome of the cucur- 


164 - 


A TKEATISE.*’ 


bite and the scales of modern physics and modern chem- 
istry, have refused to accept ; those sciences exist and 
continue to be practised ; though, since the study of 
them has, for the last two centuries, been neglected by 
the most highly gifted minds, those sciences have made 
no progress. 

Now, confining our attention to what may possibly be 
accomplished by means of divination : — To believe that 
the antecedent events of a man’s life, the secrets known 
to him and to him only, can be immediately represented 
by cards, which he shuffles and cuts, and the fortune- 
teller separates, according to certain mysterious laws, 
into sundry packets, is absurd ; but we must not forget 
that steam locomotion was condemned as absurd, that 
aerial navigation is still condemned as absurd ; that 
gunpowder, printing, spectacles, engraving, and the last 
grand discovery, the daguerreotype, were all condemned 
as absurd. 

If any one had gone to Napoleon and told him that a 
building or a human being is perpetually, and at all 
times, represented by an atmospheric image ; that every 
object in existence, has, suspended in the air, a spectral 
picture of itself that can be seen, that can be seized, 
Napoleon would have shut the man up in Charenton, 
just as Richelieu found a lodging in Bicetre for Solomon 
de Caux, when the Norman martyr submitted to him 
that immense discovery, steam navigation. Yet this is 
precisely what Daguerre has proved by his invention. 
Now, if God has written each man’s destiny upon his 
physiognomy, in characters that are legible to the eyes 
of certain clairvoyants — the word physiognomy being 
taken to mean the expression of the body in its entirety 
— why should not the hand, which’ represents human 
action in its totality, and is the sole instrument of its 


A TREATISE.” 


165 


manifestation, present a synopsis of the whole physiog- 
nomy ? Hence the science of chiromancy. Does not 
society imitate God ? From the aspect of a man’s hand, 
to foretell to him what the events of his life will be, is 
not a more extraordinary feat, on the part of him who is 
endowed with the faculties of the seer^ than to tell a 
soldier that he will fight, an advocate that he will plead, 
a shoe-maker that he will make shoes or boots, or a 
husbandman that he will manure and cultivate the soil. 
Let us take a striking example. Genius manifests itself 
so conspicuously that the most ignorant persons, as 
they walk th^ streets of Paris, can tell a great artist 
when they encounter one. He is like a moral sun, 
whyse rays illumine all they meet. Is not the man of 
feeble intellect recognizable by impressions exactly con-' 
trary to those produced by the man of genius ? The 
average man, again, attracts little or no attention. Most 
persons who observe social life in Paris can tell a man’s 
profession as he approaches them. Nowadays, the 
mysteries of the witches’ Sabbath, so well depicted by 
the painters of the sixteenth century, are mysteries no 
longer. The Egyptian women or men — the progenitors 
of the modern gypsies — that peculiar race which 
emigrated from the East Indies — simply drugged their 
clients with hashish. The effects produced by that con- 
serve are quite sufficient to account for the riding on 
broomsticks, the flying up chimneys, the real visions^ so 
to speak, of old women turned into young ones, the 
furious dances and the delightful music which con- 
stituted the vagaries of the reputed devil-worshipers. 

Ac the present day we stand indebted to the occult 
sciences for so many well-established and authenticated 
facts that, sooner or later, these sciences will have regu- 
lar professors, just as chemistry and astronomy now 


106 ‘‘ A TREATISE.” 

have. It is strange indeed that at a time when we are 
establishing at Paris professorships of Slavonic and^ 
Mantchu, and professorships of literatures, so unprof essa- 
ble as those of the north — which, instead of giving, 
ought to be receiving lessons, and the professors of 
which do nothing but repeat eternal articles on Shakes- 
peare and the sixteenth century — it is passing strange 
that the study of the occult philosophy, one of the glo- 
ries of the ancient university, has not been restored 
.under the name of Anthropology. In this respect Ger- 
many, that land which is at once so mature and so 
infantile, has outstripped France ; for in Germany this 
science — a science which is much more useful than the 
various philosophies^ which are, after all, but one and the 
same thing — is regularly taught. 

That certain beings should have the power of predict- 
ing future events from their germinal causes (just as the 
great inventor detects an industry or a science in some 
natural phenomenon which eludes the observation of 
the common herd) is no longer regarded as one of those 
exorbitant exceptions which set people talking ; it is the 
effect of an unknown faculty which might, in some sort, 
be deemed the somnambulism of the mind. 

If this proposition, on which the various methods of 
deciphering the future rest, be deemed absurd, the fact 
itself remains. Observe, that to predict the important 
events of the future is not a more extraordinary exhibi- 
tion of power on the part of the seer than to read the 
past ; for, according to the skeptics, the past and the 
future are alike beyond our ken. But if past events 
have left their traces behind them, it is but rational to 
presume that coming events must have their roots in the 
present. When a fortune-teller has once related fo you, 
with the utmost minuteness of detail, facts in your past 


“ A TREATISE.” lf)T 

career which are known to yourself only, he can certainly 
foretell the events that existing causes will produce. 
The moral world is fashioned, so to speak, on the pat- 
tern of the physical world ; allowing for differences of 
medium, we may expect to find the same phenomena in 
both. Accordingly, just as bodies do really project 
themselves into the atmosphere, and there create those 
spectres which the daguerreotype seizes and fixes as they 
fly, so do ideas — which are real and operative entities — 
imprint themselves upon that which we are bound to 
call the atmosphere of the spiritual world, do there pro- 
duce effects and do there spectrally exist — one is forced 
to coin phrases to describe phenomena hitherto unnamed 
— whence it follows that certain exceptionally gifted 
beings may, without any difficulty, perceive these ideal 
forms or traces of ideas. 

As to the means employed for the production of 
visions, those means will not be found to enshroud any 
very profound mystery when it is considered that ’tis 
the hand of the inquirer himself that arranges the 
objects by aid of which he is made to represent the 
accidents of his existence. As a matter of fact, in the 
material world there is an unbroken sequence of cause 
and effect. There every movement has its correspond- 
ing cause ; every cause is an integral part of the one 
great whole ; and, consequently, that one great whole is 
represented by the least movement. Rabelais, the 
greatest intellect of modern times — Rabelais, that 
epitome of Pythagoras, Hippocrates, Aristotle, and 
Dante, said, three centuries ago : “ Man is a microcosm.” 
Three centuries later, Swedenborg, the great prophet of 
Sweden, said that the earth was a man. The prophet 
therefore concurred with the precursor of infidelity in 
the grandest of all formulae. As in the life of our 


168 A TREATISE.^’ 

planet, so in human life, fate is the arbiter of all things. 
The smallest, the most trivial,. incidents are subject to it. 
Under its influence, then, great events, grand designs, 
great thoughts are reflected in the most insignificant 
actions, and with such fidelity that, if some conspirator 
shuffle and cut a pack of cards, he will write upon them 
the secret of his conspiracy in characters legible to the 
seer who is called gypsy, fortune-teller, charlatan, etc., 
etc. Once admit the doctrine of fatality, that is to say, 
the concatenation of causes, judicial astrology follows 
and becomes — what it formerly was — a vast science ; for 
it involves the possession of that deductive faculty 
which made Cuvier so great; though that fine genius 
did not exercise the faculty spontaneously as the seer 
does, but during studious nights spent in the seclusion 
of the closet. 

Judicial astrology or divination reigned for seven 
centuries, not, as now, over the poor and the unedu- 
cated, but over the highest intellects — over sovereigns, 
over queens, over the wealthy. Animal magnetism, one 
of the greatest sciences of antiquity, is an offshoot from 
the occult sciences, just as chemistry sprung from the 
alembic of the alchemist. Craniology, physiognomy, 
neurology, all derive their origin from the occult 
sciences ; and the illustrious creators of these appar- 
ently new sciences fell into one mistake only — the mis- 
take of all inventors — that of positively systematizing 
isolated facts whose generating cause has not yet been 
discovered. One day the Catholic Church, modern 
philosophy, and the law united their forces, to proscribe, 
to persecute, and to ridicule the mysteries of the Cabala 
and its adepts ; and the result was a deplorable lacuna 
of a hundred years duration in the study and the sov- 
ereignty of the occult sciences. But be that as it may. 


A TREATISE/’ 


1G9 


the people and many intelligent persons, especially 
women, continue to pay tribute to the mysterious pow- 
ers of those who can raise the veil that hides the future 
from our sight. To them these votaries go to purchase 
hope, courage, fortitude ; to purchase that which only 
religion can give ; so that this science is still practised, 
though not without certain risks. In these days, thanks 
to the toleration preached by the encyclopaedists of the 
eighteenth century, the sorcerer is exempt from torture ; 
he is amenable to the tribunals of correctional police 
only ; nor is he amenable even to them unless he have 
recourse to fraudulent manoeuvre^, by frightening his 
customers with intent to extort money from them, which 
amounts to swindling. Unfortunately, swindling, and 
even graver offenses, often accompany the exercise of 
this sublime faculty ; for tlie following reasons HC The 
admirable endowments that characterize the seer are 
often to be found in persons to whom the epithet brute 
is applied. These brutes are the chosen vessels which 
God fills with those elixirs which surprise humanity. 
From the ranks of these brutes come our prophets, such 
men as Saint Peter and Peter the Hermit. Whenever 
thought preserves its integrity, is not split up into frag- 
ments, is not dissipated in conversation, in intrigue, in 
literary work, in scientific fancies, in administrative 
labors, in efforts to invent, or in military operations, it 
is ready suddenly to burst forth in rays of prodigious 
intensity, rays that are latent as the brilliant facets of 
the diamond lie hid in the uncut stone. Let some par- 
ticular event occur ; the stored intelligence begins to 
kindle, finds wings to traverse space, and eyes divine 
that nothing can escape. Yesterday 'tw^as but a lumip of 
carbon; to-day, transformed by the jet of mysterious 
fluid that permeates it, it is a scintillating gem. Per- 


170 


“ A TREATISE.'’ 


sons of superior cultivation, persons every side of whose 
intellect is cut and polished, are unequal (except through 
one of those miracles in which God sometimes indulges) 
to the display of the supreme force. Thus the male or 
female soothsayer is almost always a mendicant of 
uncultivated intellect, a being of coarse exterior, a stone 
that has been rolled in the torrents of privation and in 
the ruts of life, where the only drain upon the vital force 
has been physical suffering. -i- In fact, the type of the 
prophet, of the seer^ is Martin the laborer, who made 
Louis XVIII. tremble by telling him a secret which only 
the king could know ; or ’tis a Mile. Lenormand, or 
(like Mme. Fontaine) a cook ; an imbecile negress, a 
herdsman, the constant companion of horned beasts, or 
a fakir, seated by the side of some pagoda, and develop- 
ing the mind to the utmost limits of its unknown som- 
nambulistic powers by mortifying the body. (It is in 
Asia that the heroes of the occult sciences have ever 
been encountered.) Now such persons — who may, in a 
certain sense, be said to fulfill the physical and chemical 
functions of electrical conductors, which are now inert 
metals, and now channels filled with mysterious fluids — 
such persons, in their ordinary state, retain their ordin- 
ary character, and when, the inspiration having departed, 
they resume that character, they frequently resort to 
schemes and practices which subject them to fine and 
imprisonment, nay, sometimes lead them even into the 
dock, and thence to the galleys, as in the case of the 
notorious Balthazar. In conclusion — and what stronger 
proof of the enormous influence exercised by carto- 
mancy over the minds* of the common people could 
there be ? — it depended upon the horoscope cast by 
Mme. Fontaine for Mme. Cibot, whether the poor musi- 
cian should live or die. 


“ A TREATISE.” 1 7 t 

Although in a history so extensive and so loaded with 
details, as a complete history of French society in the 
nineteenth century must necessarily be, certain repeti- 
tions are inevitable, it is superfluous to describe the den 
of Mme. Fontaine, since a description of it has already 
been given in “ Les Comediens Sans le Savoir.” All that 
need here be said is that Mme. Cibot walked into Mme. 
Fontaine’s house in the Rue Vieille du Temple, just as 
the regular frequenters of the Cafe Anglais walk into 
that restaurant to get their breakfast. Mme. Cibot, 
who was a very old customer of Mme. Fontaine’s, often 
introduced to her young women and gossips devoured 
by curiosity. 

The old abigail who acted as provost to the fortune- 
teller threw open the door of the sanctuary without 
giving her mistress any warning, and exclaimed : 

“ ’Tis Madame Cibot ! Step in, madame,” she added ; 
“my mistress is alone.” 

“ Well, my darling, and pray what is it brings you 
here so early ?” inquired the sorceress. 

Mme. Fontaine, who was seventy-eight years old, 
deserved the appellation sorceress ; she resembled one 
of the Parcae. 

“ My blood is completely turned ; let me have the 
grand pack,” cried Mme. Cibot. “My whole fortune is 
at stake.” 

And she proceeded to explain the position in which _ 
she stood, and asked for a prediction as to the outcome 
of her sordid hope. 

“ You don’t know what the grand pack is, do you ?” 
inquired Mme. Fontaine, solemnly. 

“No; I’m not rich enough to have seen that farce 
played ! A hundred francs, forsooth ! Asking your 


17:2 A TREATISE.” 

pardon — where should I get a hundred francs from ? 
But to-day the grand pack I must have !” 

“I don’t often use it, my darling,” replied Mme. Fon- 
taine. “ I only show it to wealthy customers on great 
occasions ; and then I get twenty-five louis for it ; for it 
wearies me, it wears me out, look you. The seizes 
me there, in the stomach. It is just like going to the 
witches’ Sabbath, as they used to say.” 

“ But when I tell you, my good Madame Fontaine, 
that my future n’is involved — ” 

“Well, well ; for you, who have brought me so many 
customers, I will consult the Spirit," replied Mme. Fon- 
taine, whose decrepit face assumed a terrified expres- 
sion that was perfectly genuine. 

Thereupon she quitted her old and greasy arm-chair 
at the corner of the fire-place, and walked to her table, 
which was covered with a green cloth completely thread- 
bare. On the left side of this table was to be seen 
an enormous toad asleep, and close behind the toad 
stood an open cage tenanted^ by a black hen with 
ruffled plumage. 

“ Ashtaroth, my boy, come here,” said the crone, as 
with a knitting-needle she gave the toad a tap on the 
back, to which he replied with a glance of intelligence. 
“And you, too. Miss Cleopatra ! Attention !” she pur- 
sued, tapping the old hen upon its beak. Mme. Fontaine 
then lapsed into meditation and remained motionless for 
a few seconds ; she looked like a corpse ; her eyes 
turned till nothing was seen of them but the whites. 
Then her whole body stiffened, and she exclaimed, in a 
sepulchral voice: “I am here!” After having auto- 
matically strewed some millet about for Cleopatra, she 
took her grand pack of cards, shuffled them convul- 
sively, and with a deep-drawn sigh made Mme. *Cibot 


’ A CHARACTEK.’^ 173 

cut them. At the sight of this image of death, as, 
crowned with a greasy turban and wrapped in an 
unsightly bed-gown, it kept its eyes fixed on the millet- 
seed which the black hen was pecking at, and summoned 
Ashtaroth to crawl about over the scattered cards, Mme. 
Cibot felt her back turn cold ; she shuddered. 'Tis 
onl3’ firm conviction that can give rise to deep emotions. 
“To be or not to be” a fundholder; that was the ques- 
tion, as Shakespeare would have said. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

“A CHARACTER FROM ONE OF HOFFMAN’S STORIES.” 

After the lapse of seven or eight minutes, during 
which the sorceress opened, and in a hollow voice read 
from the pages of a conjuring book, examined the seed 
that was left, and marked the route taken by the re- 
treating toad, she proceeded to decipher the meaning 
of the cards with her colorless eyes. 

“You will succeed,” said the crone ; “although noth- 
ing will turn out as you expect. You will have a great 
deal to do. But you will reap the fruit of your labors. 
You will behave very badly ; but it will be with you as 
it is with all those who, being brought into contact with 
sick folks, are on the lookout for a legacy. You will be 
aided in your evil work by considerable personages. 
Later on, you will repent, in the agonies of death ; for 
you w’ill die, murdered by two escaped convicts (one of 
them, a little man with red hair, and the other, an old 
nian quite bald) for the sake of the fortune you will be 


174 : “a character.” 

supposed to have, by the people of the village to which 
you will retire with your second husband. Now, my 
daughter, you may pursue your course or remain quiet, 
as you please.” 

Thereupon the internal excitement that had kindled 
torches in the hollow eyes of the skeleton that was out- 
wardly so cold, subsided. When the horoscope had 
been announced, Mme. Fontaine experienced a kind of 
bewilderment, and looked exactly like an awakened 
somnambulist. She gazed all round her, with an air of 
astonishment ; then, recognizing Mme. Cibot, she 
seemed surprised to find her a prey to the horror 
depicted in her features. 

“Well, my daughter,” said the sorceress, in a voice 
quite different from that which she had used when 
prophesying, “ are you satisfied ?” 

Mme. Cibot looked with a dazed expression at the 
inquirer, and found herself unable to reply. 

“Ah ! you would hsiVQ the grand pack ; I treated you 
as an old acquaintance. Give me a hundred francs ; 
but — ” 

“ Cibot ! die !” cried the portress. 

“ I have told you some terrible things, then T* said 
Mme. Fontaine, with the utmost ingenuousness. 

“ I should think so !” said Mme. Cibot, taking from 
her pocket a hundred francs and laying them on the 
table. “To die, murdered !” 

“Ah ! you see, you would \\2iVQ. the grand pack. But 
take comfort ; the people whom the cards kill do not 
always die.” 

“But is it possible. Mistress Fontaine?” 

“Oh! my little beauty, / know nothing about the 
matter ! You wished to knock at the door of the 


“ A CHARACTER.” 


1 7 ") 

future; I merely pulled the string, that’s all; and 
came !” 

He, who’s heV asked Mme. Cibot. 

“ Why, the Spirit, of course,” replied the sorceress, 
impatiently. 

“Adieu, Mistress Fontaine!” cried the portress. 
“Little did I know what the grand pack was ; you have 
thoroughly frightened me, indeed you n’have !” 

“ Mistress doesn’t put herself into that condition twice 
a month,” said the servant, as she accompanied the 
portress to the landing. “She would die of the exer- 
tion ; it tires her so much. Now she will eat a dish of 
cutlets and sleep for three hours.” 

As Mme. Cibot pursued her way through the streets, 
she did what all those who seek advice of any kind 
invariably do ; she believed all that told in her favor, 
and doubted the reality of the predicted misfortunes. 
On the morrow, fortified in her resolutions, she be- 
thought her to move heaven and earth in order that she 
might grow rich by securing the gift of a portion of 
the Pons Museum. To devise such measures as might 
conduce to the success of her scheme, was, for a time, 
her only thought. The phenomenon which we explained 
but now, namely, the concentration of the mental facul- 
ties in common people, who, not being called upon, as 
their betters are, for the daily expenditure of their 
intellectual capital, find it intact when that powerful 
engine — the fixed idea — begins to sway their spirits, now 
manifested itself in a remarkable manner in the conduct 
of Mme. Cibot. Just as the fixed idea produces marvel- 
ous escapes and miracles of sentiment, so cupidity, 
working on the brain of this portress, rendered her as 
potent as a Nucingen on the verge of bankruptcy, as 


176 “ A CHARACTER.’’ / 

acute, beneath her apparent stupidity, as the seductive 
La Palferine. 

Some days after her interview with Mme. Fontaine, 
seeing Remonencq engaged in opening his shop at 
about seven o’clock in the morning, she sidled up to 
him and said to him : 

“What are we to do in order to find out the value of 
the things up yonder in my gentlemen’s rooms ?” 

“ Oh ! that’s easy enough,” said the curiosity-dealer 
in that revolting the reproduction of Avhich is not 
essential to the clearness of the narrative ; “ if you will 
deal frankly with me, I will name a valuer, a very honest 
man, who will know what the pictures are worth, almost 
to a penny.” 

“ Who’s that ?” 

“Monsieur Magus, a Jew, who never does any busi- 
ness now except by way of amusement.” 

Elie Magus, whose name is so well known in the 
“ Comedie Hhmaine ” that it is unnecessary to describe 
him, had retired from the business of dealer in pictures 
and curiosities, and, in his capacity of tradesman, had 
followed in the footsteps of Pans the amateur. Those 
celebrated valuers, the late Henry, Messieurs Pigeotand 
Moret, Theret, Georges and Roehn — in short, the experts 
of the Museum — were mere children as compared with 
Elie Magus, who could smell a chef-d'Kuvre under a coat- 
ing -of dirt a hundred years old, and knew all the schools 
of painting and the style of every painter. 

This Jew, who had come to Paris from Bordeaux, had 
given up business in 1835, without giving up his poverty- 
stricken exterior. This he retained faithful, as most 
Jews are to the traditions of the race. During the Mid- 
dle Ages, the Jews, in order to divert suspicion, were 
compelled to be perpetually complaining, whining and 


“ A CHARACTER/’ 177 

pleading poverty ; and these exploded necessities 
became (as always happens) a popular instinct, an ende- 
mic vice. Elie Magus, by dint of buying and selling 
diamonds, bartering pictures and lace, choice curiosities, 
and enamels, fine sculpture and old jewelry, had secretly 
amassed a large fortune in this branch of trade, which is 
now so extensively carried on. In fact, the number of 
dealers in Paris is now ten times as large as it was twenty 
years ago. Paris is the city in which all the curiosities 
in the world foregather. As to pictures, there are only 
three cities in which they are sold — Rome, London and 
Paris. 

Elie Magus dwelt in the Chaussee des Minimes, a street 
leading to the Place Royale. In that street, whose 
magnitude belies its name, he owned an old mansion 
which he had bought, in 1831, for an old song, as the 
saying is. This magnificent edifice contained a most 
luxurious suite of rooms which had been fitted up during 
the Louis Quinze period. In fact, it was the old Hotel 
de Maulincourt. It had been built by that celebrated 
president of the Cour des Aides, and had escaped 
destruction during the Revolution by reason of its 
position. Now since, in defiance of the laws of Israel, 
the old Jew had made up his mind to turn landowner, 
you may be sure that he had excellent reasons for his 
conduct. The old man had done what we all do in our 
declining years ; he had developed a passion, which had 
grown into a mania. Although he was as great a miser 
as his deceased friend Gobseck, he allowed himself to 
become infected with a passionate admiration for the 
masterpieces in which he dealt ; but his taste for them 
had grown more and more refined and fastidious, until 
it had become one of those passions which are per- 
mitted only to sovereigns who are wealthy and love the 


“ A CHARACTER.” 


1T« 


Arts.* Just as the second King of Prussia cared little for 
a grenadier under six feet high, and would spend enor- 
mous sums in order to add to his animated museum of 
grenadiers a specimen who reached that standard, so 
the enthusiasm of the retired picture-dealer was aroused 
only by the faultless specimens of the painter’s art — 
specimens that had never been retouched by an inferior 
hand, and were first-rate of their kind. Elie Magus 
accordingly went to every important sale, attended every 
mart, and traveled all over Europe. This gold-enamored, 
ice-cold heart warmed up on beholding a masterpiece, 
just as an exhausted voluptuary kindles at the sight of 
a peerless beauty, and devotes himself to the discovery 
of such paragons. This Don Juan of the picture-gallery, 
this idolater of the ideal, found in his enthusiastic 
admiration joys superior to those that the contempla- 
tion of gold yields to the miser. Elie Magus lived in a 
seraglio of beautiful pictures ! 

These masterpieces were lodged as befits the children 
of princes. In the old Hotel de Maulincourt they occu- 
pied the whole of the first story, which Elie Magus had 
caused to be restored with remarkable splendor ! The 
window-curtains were of the finest Venetian gold bro- 
cade ; the most magnificent products of the Savonnerie 
carpeted the floors. The pictures, to the number of 
about one hundred, were inclosed in the most splendid 
frames, which had been tastefully regilded by the only 
conscientious gilder that Elie could find in all Paris — 
Servais, to wit, whom the old Jew had instructed in the 
art of gilding with English gold (which is infinitely 
superior to that of the French gold-beaters.) Servais 
is, as a gilder, what Thouvenin was as a book-binder — an 
artist who loves his craft. The windows of this first 
floor were protected by shutters lined with sheet iron. 


179 


OHARACTEK.-' 

Magus himself occupied a couple of attics on the second 
floor — two meanly furnished rooms, encumbered with 
his rags, and redolent of Jewish habits, for as the com- 
mencement of his life had been, even so was its close. 

On the ground floor, which was entirely taken up by 
the pictures that the Jew still continued to barter, and 
by the packing-cases in which they had been sent from 
abroad, there was a vast studio wherein Moret, the most 
skilful of our picture cleaners — a man who ought to be 
employed by the authorities of the Museum — spent 
almost the whole of his time in working for Magus. On 
this floor also were the appartments of Elie’s daughter, 
the child of his old age, a Jewess who was beautiful 
with the beauty common to all Jewesses in whose fea- 
tures the pure Asiatic type is reproduced. Noemi was 
under the protecting care of two female servants, both of 
whom were fanatics, and of Jewish extraction. A Pol- 
ish Jew named Abramko, who, through some extraor- 
dinary freak of fortune, had been compromised by the 
course of events in Poland, and had been saved by Elie 
Magus, as a matter of speculation, was Noemi’s advance 
guard. This Abramko, the porter of this silent, drear 
and desolate abode, occupied a lodge garrisoned Ey three 
extremely ferocious dogs, one of which was a New- 
foundland, another a Pyrenean dog, and the third an 
English bull-dog. 

The Jew, who used to quit his home without any feel- 
ing of uneasiness, to sleep soundly and dread no attack, 
either upon his daughter — his chief treasure — or upon 
his pictures, or upon his gold, had good reasons for this 
freedom from anxiety which was based upon the follow- 
ing deeply planned precautions : Abramko’s wages 
were raised eight pounds every year ; he was not to 
receive a single doit at the death of Magus, who was 


ISO 


‘‘A CHARACTER.” 


bringing him up to be the money-lender of the neighbor- 
hood ; he never opened the door to any caller without 
subjecting him to a preliminary scrutiny through a 
grated window. Abramko, a man of herculean build, 
worshiped Magus as Sancho Panza worshiped Don 
Quixote. The dogs were chained up during the day, 
but at nightfall Abramko unchained them ; whereupon, 
in accordance with the cunning calculations of the Jew, 
one of them would station himself in the garden, at the 
foot of a post, on the top of which a bit of meat was 
hooked ; the second would plant himself in the court at 
the foot of a similar post, and the third in the large saloon 
on the ground floor. The reader will at once perceive 
that these dogs, whose untutored instinct led them to 
guard the house, were themselves guarded by their 
hunger. The fairest female of their race w'ould not 
have seduced them from their posts at the foot of their 
greased poles, which they did not quit to sniff at any- 
thing. Did a stranger present himself, the three dogs 
forthwith imagined that he had designs upon their food, 
the food w^hich was never lowered to them until Abramko 
rose in the morning. This infernal submissiveness on the 
part of the dogs was attended by immense advantages. 
They never barked ; the genius of Magus had promoted 
them to the rank of savages ; they had become as 
sullenly taciturn as Mohicans. Now mark the result. 
One day, certain malefactors, encouraged by the prevail- 
ing silence, took it into their heads that they would 
have little difficulty in cleaning out the cash-box of the 
Jew^ The one who was selected to lead the attack 
mounted the garden wall, and was in the act of descend- 
ing, when the bull-dog, who had heard the whole pro- 
ceeding without, up to that point, interfering, no sooner 
found the gentleman’s foot within reach of his canine 


“ A CHAKACTEk/’ 


ISI 

jaws than he bit it clean off and eat it. The robber had 
courage enough to recross the wall and walk upon the 
bleeding stump until he reached his comrades, and, 
falling fainting into their arms, was- by them borne off. 
This charming little episode of “The Parisian Nights” 
was duly chronicled in the “ Gazette des Tribunaux,” 
under the head of “ Doings in Paris,” and was taken for 

Magus, who was now seventy-five years of age, might 
well live to be a hundred. Rich as he was, he lived as 
the Remonencqs lived. Three thousand francs covered 
his annual expenses, including his extravagances on 
behalf of his daughter. The old man led a life of the 
severest regularity. He rose with the sun, and made 
his breakfast on bread rubbed with garlic. That carried 
him on till the dinner hour. He always dined at home, 
and with monastic frugality. The interval between his 
rising and noon was employed by the monomaniac in 
pacing up and down the apartment that contained his 
masterpieces. There he dusted everything, furniture as 
well as pictures ; and never did his admiration flag. 
Then he would go down to his daughter’s room, and 
having drunk deep of the pleasures of paternity, would 
set off on his rambles through Paris, attend sales, visit 
exhibitions, and so forth. When he stumbled on a 
masterpiece, in a state which satisfied his self-imposed 
conditions, the blood began to course more quickly 
through his veins ; here was a cunning stroke of busi- 
ness to be done, a transaction to be carried through, a 
battle of Marengo to be gained ! In order to secure this 
new sultana for a moderate sum he would heap artifice on 
artifice. Magus had his own private map of Europe — 
a map on which the local habitation of every master- 
piece is marked — and he instructed his co-religionists in 


182 ‘‘ A charactek/’ 

each locality to keep a watchful eye upon the business 
on his behalf — for a consideration. If Magus took a 
world of trouble how vast was his reward ! 

For it is Magus who possesses the two lost pictures of 
Raphael which the Raphaelites have sought with so 
much persistence ; Magus is the owner of the original 
portrait of Giorgione’s mistress — the woman for whose 
sake the artist died ; and the so-called originals are but 
copies of this illustrious picture which, in Magus’ 
opinion, is worth no less than five hundred thousand 
francs. Magus is the owner of Titian’s masterpiece, 
“The Burial of Christ,” a picture that was painted for 
Charles V., and sent by the great artist to the great 
emperor accompanied by a letter which is throughout 
in Titian’s handwriting, and is gummed to the bottom 
of the picture. Magus possesses the original painting, 
the rough sketch from which all the portraits of Philip 
II. were taken. His other pictures, to the number of 
ninety-seven, are all of similar rank and distinction. So 
that Magus laughs to scorn our poor Museum, ravaged 
as it is by the solar rays which, passing through win- 
dows that act like so many lenses, corrode the finest 
pictures. The only admissible method of lighting a 
picture-gallery is to light it from the ceiling. With his 
own hand did Magus open and close the shutters of his 
museum, bestowing as much care upon it as he bestowed 
upon his other idol — his daughter. Ah ! full well did 
the old picture-maniac understand the laws that govern 
paintings ! According to him, masterpieces had a life 
peculiar to themselves ; they changed with the [chang- 
ing hour ; their beauty depended on the light that 
shone upon them ; the old man talked about his pictures 
as the Dutch used to talk about their tulips, and would 
pay a visit to such and such a painting at the moment 


183 


CHARACTER.” 

when it was to be seen in all its glory under the influence 
of a clear bright sky. 

Clad in a wretched little coat, a silk waistcoat of ten 
years standing, and a greasy pair of trousers, this little 
old man with the bald head, the hollow cheeks, the 
quivering beard of prickly white, the pointed, threaten- 
ing chin, the toothless mouth, eye bright as that of his 
own dogs, thin, bony hands, obelisk-nose, and cold and 
wrinkled skin, as he stood smiling at these beautiful 
creations of genius, was a living picture among all those 
inanimate pictures. A Jew in the midst of three millions 
of money will ever be one of the finest spectacles in the 
repertory of humanity. Our great actor, Robert Medal, 
sublime as he is, cannot soar to that poetic height ! 
There are more of such originals as Magus in Paris than 
in any other city in the world. The eccentricities of 
London ^always wind up by becoming disgusted with 
the objects of their adoration, just as they become dis- 
gusted with life ; while your Parisian monomaniac, on 
the contrary, dwells with his chimera in a happy state 
of intellectual communion. At Paris you will encounter 
many a Pons and many an Elie Magus, most shabbily 
dressed creatures, with noses (like that of the permanent 
secretary of the French Academy) pointing due west, 
and who seem to be without cares and without sensa- 
tions, who never look at a woman or a shop, walk about, 
so to speak, hap-hazard, with nothing in their pockets, 
and — to all outward seeming — nothing in their pates. 
“ To what tribe of Parisian can these folks belong ?” you 
ask yourself. Well, these men are millionaires, collec- 
tors, the most impassioned people in the world, people 
who are quite capable of pushing forward into the miry 
region of the police-court — as Elie Magus actually did. 


184 


A CHARACTER. 






one fine day, in Germany — in their eagerness to possess 
a cup, a picture, or some rare coin. 

Such, then, was the expert to whom Mme. Cibot was, 
with much mystery, conducted by Remonencq, who was 
in the habit of consulting Elie Magus whenever they 
met on the boulevard, and to whom the Jew, well know- 
ing the trustworthiness of the former commissionaire, 
had, on sundry occasions, advanced money through 
Abramko. The Chaussee des Minimes being only a few 
steps from the Rue de Normandie, the two accomplices, 
in the stroke of business to be done, reached their 
destination in ten minutes. 

“You are going to see the wealthiest retired curiosity-^ 
dealer and the greatest connoisseur in Paris,” said 
Remonencq to the lady. 

Mme. Cibot was astounded at finding herself in the 
presence of a little old man, dressed in a great-coat too 
much worn to be worthy of Cibot’s amending hand, and 
occupied in watching his picture-restorer, a painter, who 
was engaged in touching up a picture in a bare room on 
the vast ground floor which we have mentioned. When 
she caught the glance of those eyes, which were as full 
of calculating mischief as those of a cat, she trembled. 

“What do you want, Remonencq?” inquired the 
Jew. 

“ I want some pictures valued ; and you are the only 
person in Paris who can tell a poor coppersmith like me 
what he may venture to give for them when he has not 
hundreds and thousands as you have.” 

“Where are they ?” asked Elie Magus. 

“This is the portress of the house ; she is the gen- 
tleman’s housekeeper, and I have made arrangements 
with her — ” 


185 


A CHARACTER,” 

“ What is the name of the owner of the pictures ?’' 

‘‘ Monsieur Pons,” said Mme. Cibot. 

“ I don’t know him,” replied Magus, assuming an 
ingenuous air, and with his own foot gently pressing 
that of his picture-cleaner. 

Moret, who, being a painter, knew the value of the 
Pons Museum, had brusquely raised his head. This 
little bit of by-play could have been hazarded only in 
the presence of persons such as Remonencq and Mme. 
Cibot. The Jew, using his eyes as a gold-weigher uses 
his scales, had appraised the moral value of the portress 
at a glance. Both she and her accomplice were neces- 
sarily ignorant of the fact that the worthy Pons and 
Magus had often taken the length of each other’s claws 
In fact, these two ferocious amateurs were envious of 
each other. The old Jew had, accordingly, just exper- 
ienced a sort of mental dazzlement. He had never 
hoped to penetrate into so well-guarded a harem: The 
Pons Museum was the only museum in Paris that could 
be compared with that of Magus. The same idea that 
had occurred to Pons had occurred to Magus ; only it 
occurred to him twenty years later. But as being that 
hybrid, a tradesman-amateur, he, like the late Dusom- 
merard, had been excluded from the Pons Museum. 
Pons and Magus were both imbued with the same 
jealous feeling ; both of them shunned that publicity 
which the owners of collections generally court. To be 
enabled to examine the gallery of the poor musician 
afforded Elie Magus as much delight as a lover of 
the fair sex would derive from a surreptitious visit 
to the boudoir in which a jealous friend had seques- 
tered a beautiful mistress. 

The great respect evinced by Remonencq for this 
strange personage, and the spell that all genuine power 


186 


A CHARACTER.” 


— even though it be mysterious — exerts, rendered Mme. 
Cibot supple and submissive ; she dropped the auto- 
cratic tone that she adopted in the lodge in her inter- 
course with her two gentlemen and with the other 
occupants of the house, accepted Magus’ conditions, and 
promised to introduce him into the Pons Museum that 
very day. Now, this was admitting the enemy into the 
very citadel itself ; this was equivalent to plunging a 
dagger into the heart of Pons, who, for ten years past, 
had laid upon Mme. Cibot a strict injunction not to 
allow any one whomsoever to enter his apartments, and 
had always taken his keys with him when he went out ; 
and this injunction Mme. Cibot had obeyed so long as 
she shared the opinions of Schmucke in the matter of 
bric-^-brac. Indeed, the worthy Schmucke, by treating 
all these magnificent works as mere gewgaws, and 
bewailing Pons’ mania, had instilled his own contempt 
for the old rubbish into the mind of the portress, and 
thus secured the Pons Museum from invasion for many 
a year. 

Since Pons had been confined to his bed, Schmucke 
had acted as his deputy, both at the theatre and in the 
schools that Pons attended. The poor German, who 
saw his friend only in the morning and at dinner-time 
tried to meet all demands by keeping together both 
Pons’ connection and his own. But the task exhausted 
all the old man’s energies, diminished as they were by 
his overwhelming grief. Seeing the poor man so 
dejected, the pupils and the theatrical folk — to all of 
whom Schmucke had communicated the fact of Pons’ 
illness — asked him about the health of the patient ; and 
so profound was the sorrow of the old pianist that even 
the indifferent assumed that affectation of concern which 
is the Parisan’s tribute to capital catastrophes. As 


“a character.” 18T 

with Pons so with Schmucke, the vital principle itself 
was attacked. Nor was it only from his own pangs that 
Schmucke suffered ; he suffered also with his suffering 
friend. His mind was so full on the subject that he 
would talk about Pons during a full half of the time that 
should have been devoted to the lesson he was giving ; 
he would so naively break off in the middle of an expla- 
nation to ask himself how his friend was faring, that his 
youthful pupil would find herself listening to a disquisi- 
tion on Pons’ ailments. In the interval between two 
lessons, Schmucke would rush off to the Rue de Nor- 
mandie to spend a quarter of an hour by the bedside of 
his friend. Scared at the emptiness of the joint cash- 
box, and alarmed by Mme. Cibot, who during the last 
fortnight had been doing her best to swell the expenses 
of the sick-room, the old pianist found that a new-born 
courage, for which he would never have given himself 
credit, enabled him to rise superior to his troubles. 
Now, for the first time in the whole course of his Career, 
he wanted to get money, in order that there might be 
no dearth of it at home. When one of his young lady 
pupils, who felt a genuine pity for the two friends, asked 
Schmucke how he could bear to leave Pons all alone, 
he replied, with the sublime simplicity of the dupe : 
“ Matemoiselle, we have Montame Zibod ! ein treasure ! 
ein bearl ! Bons is gared for as if he were ein brinze !” 
Now, directly Schmucke was engaged in trotting from 
street to street. Dame Cibot became mistress of the 
apartments and the invalid. How was it possible for 
Pons, who had eaten nothing for a fortnight, who was 
lying prostrate in his bed, who was so feeble that, when- 
ever the bed required making, Mme. Cibot was obliged 
to raise him in her arms and place him in an easy-chair 
. — how was it possible for Pons to keep a watchful eye 


188 


“prattle and politics.” 

upon that self-styled guardian angel ? As a matter of 
course, Dame Cibot paid her visit to Elie Magus while 
Schmucke was at breakfast. 

She was back again in time to witness the parting 
between Schmucke and the patient ; for since the reve- 
lation of Pons’ potential wealth, Dame Cibot had stuck 
closely to her old bachelor ; she brooded over him. 
Ensconced in a snug arm-chair at the foot of the bed, 
she treated Pons — by way of amusing him — to a flood 
of gossip such as women of her stamp excel in. She 
had grown coaxing, gentle, attentive, anxious, and had 
thus, with Machiavellian skill, obtained an influence 
over Pons’ mind, as we shall see. 


CHAPTER XV. 

“ PRATTLE AND POLITICS OF OLD PORTRESSES.” 

Scared by the prediction that was the outcome of 
Mme. Fontaine’s manipulation of the grand pack. Dame 
Cibot had entered into a compact with herself to secure 
the object that she had in view — namely, a legacy under 
Pons’ will — by gentle measures, and without resorting 
to overt acts of villainy. During a period of ten years 
she had remained ignorant of the value of the Pons 
Museum, and now, finding that the accumulated attach- 
ment, integrity and disinterestedness which she had 
displayed during those years was standing to her credit, 
she resolved to discount this magnificent security. 
Since the day when Remonencq, by using a phrase that 
was eloquent of gold, had hatched in the heart of this 


‘^PRATTLE AND POLITICS.’’ , 189 

woman a serpent which had lain there in its shell for 
five-and-twenty years — namely, the desire to be rich — 
she had nourished the reptile on all the evil leaven 
which lurks in the inmost recesses of the human soul. 
We shall now see how she proceeded to carry out the 
counsel which the serpent was hissing into her ear. 

‘•Well! and has our cherub drank plenty of stuff? 
Is he any better?” she inquired of Schmucke. 

“ He is not going on well, not well, my tear Montame 
Zibod,” replied the German, as he wiped away a tear. 

“Bah! You frighten yourself needlessly, my dear 
sir. You must take things as they come. If Cibot were 
actually at the point of death, I shouldn’t be so down- 
cast as you are. Come ! our cherub has a good consti- 
tution ; and then, you see, it seems he’a led a prudent 
life ; you don’t know what an age people as have lived 
prudently run to. He is very ill, that’s for certain ; but, 
^with the care n’l take of him, I shall manage to pull 
him round. So make your mind easy, and go and see 
after your business ; I’ll keep him company and see as 
he drinks his quarts of barley-water.” 

“If it were nod for you, I should tie of anxiety,’, said 
Schmucke, pressing the hand of his worthy housekeeper 
in a manner that was intended to intimate his trust in 
her ; whereupon Mme. Cibot went into Pons’ bedroom 
wiping her eyes. 

“What is the matter, Madame Cibot?” said Pons. 

“ It’s Monsieur Schmucke as upsets me,” said the 
portress. “ He cries about you as if you were a dead 
man ! Now, though true it is that you’re not well, 
you’re not so bad that people need cry over you ; but 
still I feel it very much. My God ! what a fool I am 
to be so fond of people and to care more for you than 
I do for Cibot ! For, after all, you’re nothing to me ; 


190 


PRATTLE AND POLITICS. 


(( 




we’re not any ways related to each other — except 
through the first woman. Well, I vow and .declare, 
your illness has given me quite a turn ; upon my 
word and honor it has. I’d stand to have my hand 
cut off — my left hand, of course — here under your very 
nose if I could see you a-coming and a-going, a-eating 
and a-cheating of the dealers as you’ve been n’accus- 
tomed to. If I’d ha’ had a child, I think I should have 
loved it n’as I love you ; now ! Come, do drink, 

my pet ; come now, a good glassful. Will you drink, 
monsieur? The first thing Monsieur Poulain said was : 
‘If Monsieur Pons don’t want to go to Pere-Lachaise, 
he must drink as many pailfuls of water as an Auvergnat 
sells in a day.’ So, come now, drink !” 

“But, my good Cibot, I am drinking ; I drink till my 
stomach is literally drowned.’’ 

“ There, that’s right,” said the portress, taking the 
empty glass. “ You’ll get well if you do that ! Mon- 
sieur Poulain had a patient like you as was deserted by 
his children, and hadn’t no one to look after him, and 
he died of this same complaint, and all for the want of 
drinking ! (So, you see, you must drink, my duck !) 
Which they buried him, two months agone. Do you 
know that if you was to die, my dear sir, you’d take that 
worthy man. Monsieur Schmucke, with you ; ’pon my 
word and honor, he’s just like a child, he is. Ah ! how 
he does love you, the dear lamb ! No ! no woman loves 
a man so much as that. He’s quite lost all relish for 
his victuals^ and he’s grown that thin within the last 
fortnight, ay, as thin as you are, and you’re naught but 
skin and bone. It makes me feel quite jealous, for I’m 
very fond of you myself ; though I haven’t come to that 
yet ; I haven’t lost my n’appetite ; n’on the contrary, 
quite the reverse. Forced as I am to keep on a-running 


‘‘prattle and politics.^ 


191 


up and down-stairs, my legs get so tired that of an 
evening I sink down just like a lump o’ lead. Then 
there’s that there poor Cibot of mine, don’t I neglect 
him for your sake, which Mademoiselle Remonencq 
gets him his victuals, which he grumbles at me because 
they aren't nice. Well, then, I says to him, as how we 
ought to put up with things for the sake of other folks, 
and that you’re too ill to be left alone. In the first 
place, you’re not well enough to do without a nurse ! 
But you don’t catch me allowing a nurse to come in 
here, when I’ve looked after you and been your house- 
keeper myself these ten years. And they all so fond of 
their stomachs, too, which they eat you out of house 
and home, and want wine and sugar and their foot- 
warmers and their comforts. And then there they rob 
their patients unless their patients put them down for 
something in their wills. Just put a nurse in here to- 
day and see whether there wouldn’t be a picture or 
something else missing' to-morrow — ” 

“ Oh ! Madame Cibot,” cried Pons, quite beside him- 
self ; “don’t leave me! Don’t let anything be 
touched !” 

“ Here I am,” said Dame Cibot ; “and here I’ll stop, 
as long as I’ve got any strength left. Make your 
mind easy ! Didn’t Monsieur Poulain, who’s got an 
eye on your treasures maybe, didn’t he want to get a 
nurse for you ? Ah ! Didn’t I just give him a look, 
that’s all? ‘There’s no one but me as’ll suit Monsieur 
Pons,’ I says to him ; ‘ he knows my ways as I knows 
his’n.’ And with that he held his tongue. But a nurse ; 
why, them nurses are all of ’em thieves ! How I hates 
them women ! I’ll just show you now what schemers 
they are. Well, then, an old gentleman — now mark 
you, it was Monsieur Poulain as told me this — well, a 


192 ‘‘ PKATTLE AND POLITICS." 

Madame Sabatier, a woman of thirty-six, who once sold 
slippers at the palace — you must remember the shop 
gallery at the palace that has been pulled down 
Pons nodded his head by way of assent. “ Well, this 
woman, then, didn’t get on well along of her husband, 
which he drunk everything, and died of spontaneous 
imbustion ; well, she was a handsome woman in her 
time, no doubt — one must tell the truth, you know — 
but that did her no good ; though it is said that she had 
friends among the advocates. Well, as I was a-saying, 
when she came to grief she took to monthly nursing ; 
yes, sir, and she lives in the Rue Barre du Bee. Well, 
then, you must know, she went out to nurse an n’old 
gentleman, who’n, no offense to you, sir, had something 
the matter with his lurinary liver, and they used to 
sound him, just for all the world as if he’d been a n'arte- 
sian well ; which he wanted so much waiting on, that 
she was used to sleep on a folding-bed in his room. 
Would you believe it now ? But no doubt you’ll tell 
me: ‘Men have no respect for anything or anybody, 
they’re so selfish !’ Well, as she was a-talking to him — 
for she was always there, you understand ; she cheered 
him up, told him stories, made him prattle, just like you 
and me are jabbering away now ; well, she finds out as 
his nephews — for the patient had some nephews — were 
regular monsters as caused him a lot of worry, and — to 
cut a long tale short — as it was his nephews as was the 
cause of his illness. Well, my dear sir, she saved that 
’ere gentleman and became his wife, and they have a 
child now as is superb, and which Madame Bordevin, 
what keeps the butcher’s shop in the Rue Chariot, which 
she’s related to the lady, stood godmother. There’s 
luck for you now ! As for me. I’m married ; but I 
haven’t got no child, and I must say it’s all Cibot’s fault. 


193 


“prattle and politics.” 

for he’s overfond of me ; for if I wished — but I’ll say no 
more. What on earth would have become of us, me and 
my Cibot, if we had a family, us as haven’t a half-penny 
that we can call our own, n’after thirty years honesty, 
my dear sir? But what consoles me is as I haven’t a 
farthing of any one else’s money ; I’ve never wronged 
nobody. Look here, now, let’s just suppose, which I’m 
free to say it, seeing as how you’ll be upon your pegs 
again in six weeks time, a-sauntering along the boule- 
vards ; well, then, we’ll suppose as you puts me down 
for something in your will ; well, I should never rest till 
I’d found out your lawful heirs so as I might give it 
back to them ; I’ve such a horror of money as I don’t 
earn by the sweat of my brow.* You’ll say to me, no 
doubt: ‘Don’t you go for to torment yourself like 
that. Mistress Cibot ; you’ve worked hard for it ; you’ve 
looked after them two gentlemen n’as if they’d been 
your own children ; you’ve saved ’em as much as a 
thousand francs a year.’ . For do you know, sir, there’s 
many a cook as ’ud have laid by a snug ten thousand 
francs by this time, if they’d stood in my shoes. ‘ Well, 
then, sure enough, it’s only fair as this good gentleman 
should you a little annuity.’ I’m only a-supposing 

as some one was to say that to me, you know. Well, 
no ; for my part. I’m quite disinterested ; I under- 
stand how there can be such things as women as do 
good with an eye to the main chance. Why, isn’t 
doing good at all ; is it, my dear sir? It’s true as I 
don’t go to church ; I’ve no time to go ; but my con- 
science tells me what it’s right to do, for all that. Now, 
don’t go for to toss yourself about like that, my kitten ! 
Don’t scratch yourself ! My God, how yellow you are, 
to be sure ; why, you’re that yellow you’re well-nigh 
brown. What a queer thing it is that in twenty days 


194: “ PRATTLE ANt) tOLITICS.^^ 

folks should turn as yellow as a lemon ! Well, as I was 
a-saying, honesty is the poor man’s store ! one 7)iu5t 
have something to bless themselves with ! Well, now, 
even supposing as the worst came to the worst, I should 
be the very first to tell you as you ought to give all your 
belongings to Monsieur Schmucke. It’s your duty so 
to do ; for he’s your whole family all in one ! Ah ! and 
he loves you, too, he does, just as a dog loves his 
master.” 

“ Oh, yes !” said Pons. “ He is the only person who 
has ever loved me in the whole course of my life — ” 

“ Oh, monsieur !” cried Dame Cibot. “ That’s not at 
all pretty of you. What about me ? Don’t / love you?” 

“I don’t say that, my dear Madame Cibot.” 

“ There, now, aren’t you just a-going for to treat me as 
if I was n’a mere servant, a common cook, just as if I’d 
no feelings whatever? Oh ! my God • Work yourself 
fit to split for a couple of old fellows for eleven years ! 
Do naught but look after their comforts ! — which I ran- 
sacked ten green-grocers’ shops and got myself becalled 
all sorts of names ’just to get you good frontage de Brie^ 
which I went all the way to the market to get you fresh 
butter ; yes, and you may take such care of everything ; 
which in all these ten years I haven’t so much as broken 
or chipped a single thing ; yes, and you may be like a 
mother is to her children ! — and what does it all come 
to ? Why ! you hears a ‘ My dear Madame Cibot,’ which 
just shows you as there isn’t one spark of feeling for you 
in the buzzom of the old gentleman as you’ve been 
a-nursing like you’d nurse the son of a king ; for the 
little King of Rome was never looked after as you’ve 
been — will you make me a bet that he was as well 
looked after as you are ? — well, the proof is that he died 
in the very prime of his life. Look you, sir, you aren’t 


“ PRA'ITLE AND POLITICS.’’ 195 

just — you’re ungrateful ! just because I’m nothing but a 
poor portress. Ah ! my God ! even you too think as 
we’re not a bit better than dogs — ” 

“ But, my dear Madame Cibot — ” 

“ Come now, you’re a learned man ; now just explain 
to me how ’tis us poor porter-folk are treated like that ; 
that no one gives us credit for having any feelings at all, 
and that we’re despised at a time when there’s so much 
talk about equality. Ain’t I as good as any other 
woman ? Me as was one of the prettiest women in 
Paris, and as was called the handsome oyster-girl, and- 
received a declaration of love seven or eight times in 
the course of the day ? Ay, and if I cared so to do, even 
now ! Why, look you, sir ; you know that dwarf of an 
old iron-dealer what lives near the entrance gate ; well, 
if I were a widow, which, in course, is n’only a supposi- 
tion, he’d marry me with his eyes shut ; for he’s opened 
them so wide at me that he’s never tired of saying to 
me: ‘Oh! what lovely arms you’ve got, Madame 

Cibot. I dreamt, only last night, that they was bread 
and that I was butter spread upon ’em.’ Look here, sir ; 
there’s a pair of arms for you !” And suiting the action 
to the word, Mme. Cibot turned up her sleeve, and dis- 
played the finest arm that could possibly be seen, an 
arm that was as white and fresh as the hand itself was 
red and wrinkled — a plump, round, dimpled arm, which, 
denuded of its case of common merino, as a sword is 
drawn from its scabbard, was enough to dazzle Pons, 
who scarcely ventured to do more than glance at it — 
“Yes,” pursued the dame, “and an arm as has opened 
as many hearts as my knife did oysters ! Well, that arm 
belongs to Cibot ; and I’ve done wrong to neglect the 
poor dear man, who’d throw himself over a precipidge 
at the first word as I uttered, for your sake, monsieur, 


196 ‘‘PEATTLE AND POLITICS.” 

you as calls me my dear Madame Cibot, when I’d do 
unpossibilities for you — ” 

“But do listen to me,” said the sick man ; “ I can’t 
call you my mother or my wife — ” 

“ No, never again, as long as I lives, nor as long as I 
breathe, will I get attached to nobody — ” 

“ But do let me speak,” pleaded Pons. “ Look you, 
in the first place, I have spoken to Schmucke !” 

“Ah, Monsieur Schmucke! Now, there’s a heart for 
you!” said she. “Yes, loves me, does; because 
he’s poor. It’s money as makes people unfeeling ; and 
you are rich ! Well then, have a nurse, and see what a 
life she'll lead you ! Why, she’ll torment you like a 
cockchafer — if the doctor says that you must be made 
drink, she’ll give you nothing but solid food ; she’ll just 
bury you first and rob you afterward ! You don’t 
deserve to have a Madame Cibot ! Come now ! when 
Monsieur Poulain comes to see you, you just ask him 
for a nurse ?” 

“ But, in the name of all that’s sacred, listen to me !” 
cried the indignant patient. “ I did not refer to women 
when I spoke of my friend Schmucke, did I ? I know 
well enough that you and he are the only two persons 
who sincerely love me — ” 

“Will you just have the goodness not to flare up like 
that ?” exclaimed Madame Cibot, making a rush at 
Pons, and compelling him, by main force, to lie down 
again. 

“ But how can I help being fond of you ?” said poor 
Pons. 

“ You are fond of me then, really? Come, come, you 
must excuse me, monsieur,” said she, weeping and wip- 
ing her eyes. “Yes, yes, you love me, as you might 
love a servant to whom you leave an annuity of six 


‘‘ PRATTLE AND POLITICS.” 197 

hundred francs, just as you might throw a bit of bread 
to a dog.” 

“ Oh ! Madame Cibot,” cried Pons ; “ what do you 
take me for? You do not know me !” 

“Ah! then you love me more than that ?” resumed 
INIadame Cibot ; “ you love your good stout Cibot like 
a mother ? Well, that’s just how it is ; I am your 
mother, and you two are just my children ! Ah ! if I 
only knew who it is that has caused you all this trouble. 
I’d get myself sent to the assizes, or even to the police- 
court, for I’d tear their eyes out for ’em. Those people 
deserve to be put to death at St. James’ barrier ; and 
even that's too good for such miscreated wretches ! You 
so kind-hearted and so gentle, for yc7u nhave an heart of 
gold ; you were created and sent into the world to 
make some woman happy — yes, you would have made 
her happy, that you would — any one can see that ; you 
- are just cut out for it. Now, as for myself, when I 
saw how you jogged along with Monsieur Schmucke 
says I to myself : ‘Yes I Monsieur Pons has missed his 
vocation ; he was cut out to be a good husband.’ Come 
now, you are fond of the ladies, aren’t you ?” 

‘‘ Ah ! yes,” said Pons ; “ and I never had either wife 
or mistress — ” 

“ Really now, you don’t mean to say so !” cried Dame 
Cibot, as, with an enticing air, she went up to Pons and 
seized his hand ; “ you don’t know what it is to n’have 
a sweetheart as’ll do anthing to please her lover.? Is it 
possible? Now, 7?iy part^ if I was in your place, I 
shouldn’t like to quit this world for n’another without 
having known what’s the greatest n’happiness on n’earth. 
Poor duck ! If I weren’t what I have been, upon my 
word and honor I’d leave Cibot for your sake ! Why, 
with such a nose as you n’have — for you n’have a very 


198 


'•'prattle and politics.’’ 


fine nose — how did you manage, my poor cherub ? You 
will tell me, perhaps, as it isn’t n’every woman who knows 
how to choose a man, n’and it’s a vast pity as they should 
marry as they do, at random ; it really is. Notv, for 
my part, I thought as you n’had mistresses by the dozen, 
ballet-girls, n’actresses, duchesses ; seeing as how you 
was from home so n’often ! Yes, when I saw you 
a-going out, which I would say to Cibot : ^ Look, there’s 

Monsieur Pons a-going to look after the ladies.’ Upon 
my word and honor that’s exactly what I used to say, so 
firm was my belief as you was a favorite with the 
women ! Why, you was sent into the world to love 
and to be loved ! I could see that much, look you, my 
dear little sir, the very day as you first dined here. Ah ! 
wasn’t your n’heart full when you saw the pleasure as 
you was a-giving to Monsieur Schmucke ! And him, 
too, as was a-crying over it even the next day when he 
says to me: ‘ Montame Zibod, he tined here!’ Which 
I declare that I cried likewise, like a fool as I was. Ah ! 
and how cut up he was when you began your town-skip- 
pings again ! and took to dining out again ! Poor 
man ! never was such distress seen ! Ah ! right you are 
indeed to make him your heir ! Why, he’s as good as 
an entire family, the dear good man ! Don’t you forget 
him ; for, if you do, God won’t admit you’n into 
His paradise ; for He won’t admit any one n’as hasn’t 
shown themselves grateful to their friends, by leaving 
them legacies.” 

Pons made some vain attempt to reply ; but Dame 
Cibot talked as the wind blows. We have discovered a 
method of stopping steam-engines ; but it will puzzle 
inventive genius to find out a method of stopping the 
tongue of a portress. 

“ I know exactly what you’re going to say,” continued 


“prattle and politics.’’ 199 

she. “ But making one’s will, when one is ill, doesn’t 
kill a body ; and if I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t, in 
case of an n’accident, leave the poor lamb to take care of 
himself ; for that’s just what he is — the good creature 
of the good God ; he knows naught about anything. I 
wouldn’t leave him at the mercy of a pack of rascally 
men of business, and of your relations, which they’re all 
a lot of scums. See now, is there a single one of them 
who has been to see you during the last three weeks ? 
And you would leave your property to them! Are you 
aware that what is here is worth the trouble of leaving 
to some one ? at least so they say.” 

“ Oh ! I know that,” said Pons. 

“ Remonencq, who knows you are an amateur, and is 
a dealer himself, says as he would willingly pay you an 
annuity of thirty thousand francs, in order to have your 
pictures when you’re dead and gone. There’s a bit of 
business for you ! If I were you. I’d close with the 
offer ! But I believed that he was making game of me 
when he said that. You ought to n’inform Monsieur 
Schmucke of the value of all these things ; for he’s a man 
as is as easily deceived as a child ; he hasn’t the faintest 
notion of the value of these hne things of yours ! He 
has so little idea of it that he would go and give ’em all 
away for a mere nothing ; unless he kept ’em, out of 
pure love to you, all his life ; that is to say, if he sur- 
vives you ; but your death will be the death of him ! 
But / shall be there ! I'll defend him against the whole 
world ; me and Cibot together.” 

Dear Madame Cibot!" exclaimed Pons, quite touched 
by this terrible chatter which seemed to him to be 
imbued with the unaffected feeling characteristic of the 
poor. “What would have become of me but for you 
and Schmucke !” 


200 ‘‘prattle and politics.” 

“Ah, yes ! We n'are really the only friends you have 
on earth. That’s quite true ! But two kind hearts are 
worth all the relations in the world. Don’t talk to me 
about relations ! They are like the tongue, as the old 
actor says, a world of goodness and iniquity. Where 
are these relations of yours ? Have you got any rela- 
tions ? If you have, I never set eyes on ’em,” 

“ It is they who have laid me on this bed of sickness !” 
cried Pons, with profound bitterness. 

“Ah ! then you have some relations !” cried Madame 
Cibot, springing up as if the arm-chair in which she was 
sitting had been of iron and had suddenly become red- 
hot. “Ah, well! they are mighty well-bred people, 
these relations of yours, I must say ! Why, these twenty 
days, yes, these twenty days this very morning, have 
you been lying on your death-bed, and they haven’t 
come to inquire about you yet ! That coffee’s a little 
too strong, that is ! Why, if I were in your place. I’d 
rather leave my money to the Foundling Hospital than 
give them a single farthing !” 

“Well, my dear Madame Cibot, I intended to leave all 
I possess to my first cousin once removed, the daughter 
of my first cousin. President Camusot ; you know whom 
I mean — the judge who came here one morning about 
two months ago — ” 

“ Oh, yes ! the stout little man what sent his servants 
here to beg your pardon — for his wife’s stupidity — yes, 
and didn’t the lady’s-maid ask me a lot of questions 
about you, the conceited old minx ; I should have just 
liked to dust her velvet mantle for her with my broom- 
stick ! A lady’s-maid with a velvet mantle, indeed ! 
Was such a thing ever n’heard of ? No! upon my honor 
the world is turned topsy-turvy ! What are revolutions 
made for, n’l should like to know ? Dine twice a day. 


“prattle and politics.” 201 

if you can, and welcome, you scoundrels of plutoscraps ! 
But what 1 say is that the laws are n’useless, that nothing 
is sacred, if Louis Philippe doesn’t keep folks in their 
proper places ; for surely, if we n’are n’all equal, as we 
n’are — aren’t we? — a lady’s-maid has no right to n’have 
a velvet mantle, when here am I, Madame Cibot, with a 
character for thirty years honesty, haven’t got no velvet 
mantle ! It*s a fine thing, I must say ! We n’ought to 
be n’able to tell what folks are by their dress. A lady’s- 
maid is only a lady’s-maid, when n’all’s said and done ; 
just as I’m only a portress. What do we n’have spinach- 
seed epaulets n’in the milingtary for’n ? Every man to 
his grade, say I ! Now, shall I just let you’n into the 
secret of all this ? Well, France has just gone to perdi- 
tion, that’s the long and short of it ! Now, under the 
Emperor — eh, monsieur? — things were very differently 
managed. Well, as I was a-saying to Cibot : ‘ Now, 

look you, a family as allows its lady’s-maid to wear 
velvet mantles must be a bowelless lot — ’ ” 

“ Bowelless ! Yes ; that’s the very word,” said Pons ; 
and thereupon he proceeded to relate his grievances and 
troubles to Madame Cibot, who exploded with invec- 
tives against Pons’ relatives, exhibited, as sentence by 
sentence of the sad recital fell from his lips, the most 
marked sympathy, and wound up by bursting into a 
flood of tears ! 

In order to understand this sudden intimacy between 
the old musician and Madame Cibot, it will suffice for 
the reader to picture to himself the situation of a 
bachelor, who, for the first time in his life, is attacked 
by a serious illness and stretched upon a sick bed. 
There he lies, alone in the wide world, thrown entirely 
upon his own resources, condemned to get through the 
day as best he can, without any extraneous aid, and 


202 “prattle and politics.’^ 

finding the hours pass all the more slowly, in that he is 
the victim of the indefinable discomforts of hepatitis — a 
disorder that is enough to cast a black shadow upon the 
very brightest existence. Cut off from his numerous 
occupations, the patient falls into what may be termed 
the atrophy of Paris ; he regrets all that that city offers 
gratis to the eyes and ears of its denizens. The deep 
and tenebrous solitude that surrounds him, his com- 
plaint — a complaint that tells upon the moral, more even 
than on the physical man, the emptiness of the life he 
leads, all combine to induce the solitary bachelor (espe- 
cially if his character be naturally weak and his heart 
sensitive and credulous) to attach himself to his nurse, 
just as a drowning man clings to a plank. Accordingly, 
Pons listened with rapture to the gossip of Madame 
Cibot. To him, Schmucke, Madame Cibot and Doctor 
Poulain formed the whole of humanity, in like manner 
as his chamber was his universe. If ordinary patients 
invariably restrict their attention to objects within the 
immediate sphere of their observation, and if their indi- 
viduality exerts itself in subordination to the objects 
and persons by which they are surrounded, judge to 
what straits an old bachelor, whose affections are 
unengaged and who has never known what love is, may, 
under similar circumstances, be reduced. After a three 
weeks illness. Pons had arrived at such a pass that he 
would, at times, regret not having married Madeleine 
Vivet ! Can it then be matter of surprise, that, during 
these weeks, Madame Cibot made great progress in the 
good graces of the invalid who, but for her, would have 
given himself up for lost ; for as to Schmucke, he was 
simply a second Pons to the poor patient. The won- 
derful art — and it was unconscious art — of Madame 


A COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION.’’ ' 203 

Cibot consisted in this ; that she gave expression to 
Pons' own idea. 

“Ah ! there is the doctor," cried she, hearing the bell 
ring; and so saying she left Pons alone; for the ring 
told her that the Jew and Remonencq had arrived. 

“Don't make a noise, gentlemen," said she, “so as he 
mayn't hear anything ; for wherever his treasure is in 
question, he’s as touchy as a man can be." 

“ Oh ! a mere walk round will be sufficient,” replied 
the Jew, who was armed with his magnifying lens and 
an opera-glass. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

“ A COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION." 

The saloon containing the main portion of the Pons 
Museum was one of those old saloons that the archi- 
tects employed by the ancient nobility of France used to 
design. This saloon was twenty-five feet wide, thirty 
feet long, and thirteen feet in height. Pons’ pictures, 
sixty-seven in number, were all hung upon the four 
walls of this paneled chamber, whose panels were 
painted white and gold, though the white had turned 
yellow and the gold red beneath the touch of time, and 
thus harmonized with the pictures instead of marring 
their effect. Fourteen statues, of which some stood upon’ 
columns and some on buhl pedestals, adorned the 
corners of the room and the spaces between the pictures ; 
while carved ebony sideboards, of truly regal richness, 
lined the walls, breast high. These sideboards held 


204 ‘^A OOUNCIL OF CORRUPTION.” 

the curiosities ; while a range of credences, made of 
carved wood, occupied the middle of the saloon and 
offered to the eye of the spectator the rarest products of 
human skill, ivory-work, wood-work, bronzes, enamels, 
jewelry, porcelain, etc., etc. 

Immediately on entering this sanctum, the Jew walked 
straight up to four masterpieces, which he recognized as 
the gems of the collection and as the productions of 
masters of whose work he had no specimens. These 
four pictures were to Elie Magus what those desiderata 
which send the naturalist scampering from east to 
Occident, through tropic, desert, pampas, savannah and 
“ forest primeval ” are to the naturalist. 

The first of these pictures was a Sebastian del Piombo, 
the second a Fra Bartolomeo della Porta, the third a 
landscape by Hobbema, and the fourth, the portrait of 
a woman by Albert Durer — four diamonds ! In the 
domain of painting, Sebastian del Piombo is, as it were, 
a luminous point, in which three schools of painting 
meet and display their most remarkable qualities. This 
artist was a Venetian painter, who went to Rome for 
the purpose of catching the style of Raphael, under the 
tuition of Michael Angelo, who wanted to make Piombo 
Raphael’s rival, so that Angelo might, in the person of 
one of his lieutenants, wage war with the sovereign 
pontiff of the art of painting. Thus, in the few pictures 
which this indolent man of genius condescended to paint, 
pictures whose cartoons were, it is said, designed by 
Michael Angelo himself, Piombo combined the coloring 
of the Venetian school, the comoosition of the Floren- 
tine school, and the style of Raphael. To what per- 
fection Sebastian del Piombo, armed as he was with 
this triple power, managed to attain, may be learned 
from a careful study of his portrait of Baccio Bandinelli 


‘‘a council of cokruption.” 205 

in the Paris Museum. That portrait may safely be com- 
pared with Titian’s “ Man with a Glove,” with the 
“ Portrait of an Old Man ” (in which Raphael has united 
his own excellence to that of Correggio), and with the 
“ Charles VIII.” of Leonardo da Vinci. Piombo’s 
picture will lose nothing by the comparison. These 
four pearls are equal in water, in orience, in ronndness, " 
in brilliance, and in value. Human art can go no 
further. In these productions it is superior even to 
nature itself, which gave to the original but an 
ephemeral existence. Now, Pons possessed a picture 
painted by this great genius, Piombo ; another gem 
from his imperishable, but incurably indolent, pallet. 
This picture was a Knight of Malta Praying.” It was 
on slate ; and in point of freshness, finish and depth of 
treatment, superior even to the portrait of Baccio 
Bandinelli. The Fra Bartolomeo was a picture of the 
Holy Family, and might, with many a connoisseur, have 
passed for a picture by Raphael. The Hobbema would 
have fetched sixty thousand francs in the auction-room. 
As for the Albert Durer, this “ Portrait of a Woman ” 
was similar to the celebrated Holzschuer of Nurem- 
berg, for which the Kings of Bavaria, of Holland and of 
Prussia have, at various times, offered two hundred 
thousand francs, in vain. Is this picture a portrait of 
the wife or daughter of-the Chevalier Holzschuer, the 
friend of Albert Durer ? This hypothesis would seem to 
be a certainty ; for the woman in Pons’ picture is repre- 
sented in such an attitude that the picture apparently 
requires a pendant, and the painted coat of arms is 
arranged in the same way in both portraits. Finally, 
the cetatis sues XLI. is in exact accordance with the age 
indicated in the portrait so religiously observed by the 


206 COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION/^ 

house of Holzschuer of Nuremberg, and of which an 
engraving has recently been completed. 

Tears stood in the eyes of Elie Magus as he turned 
them now to one, now to another, of these four 
masterpieces. 

“ I will give you a bonus of two thousand francs for 
each of these pictures, if you can get them sold to me 
for forty thousand francs !” he whispered to Dame Cibot 
who was amazed at this fortune which seemed to have 
fallen from the clouds. 

The admiration, or — to speak more accurately — the 
delirium, of Magus had so disturbed his intellect, and 
so completely routed his habitual cupidity, that the Jew 
entirely disappeared, as may be seen. 

“And what am I to have?” asked Remonencq, who 
knew nothing about pictures. 

“ Everything here is of the same calibre,” slyly whis- 
pered the Jew to Remonencq. “Take any ten pictures, 
hap-hazard, on the same terms, and you are a made 
man !” 

These three thieves were still gazing at each other, 
under the influence of that delight which is of all 
delights the keenest, namely, the realization of our 
hopes of fortune, when the voice of the sick man 
resounded in their ears, in tones that vibrated like the 
sound-waves of a bell. 

“ Who is there ?” cried Pons. 

“Monsieur! get into bed again, at once,” cried 
Madame Cibot, darting up to Pons and forcing him to 
go back to bed. “ How now ! Do you want to kill 
yourself? Well, it wasn’t Monsieur Poulain ; it’s that 
honest fellow Remonencq, who’s so uneasy about you 
that he’s come to hear how you’re a-getting on. Folks 
are so fond of you that there’s not a soul in the house 


“a council of corruption.” 207 

as isn’t quite put out about you. Pray what made you 
take fright?” 

Why, it seems to me that there are several of you in 
there,” said the patient. 

“ Several ! Come now, that’s rich ! Why, you must 
bedreaming! You’ll end by going mad ; ’pon my word 
n’and honor, you will! Stay a moment ; just look — ” 
So saying Dame Cibot flew to the door and opened it, 
making a sign to Magus to withdraw, and beckoning 
Remonencq forward. 

“Well ! my dear sir,” said the Auvergnat, taking the 
cue that Madame Cibot had given him ; “ I am come to 
hear how you are getting on ; for the whole house is in 
a mortal funk about you. No one likes Death to find 
his way into a house ! And, in short. Daddy Monistrol, 
whom you know well, directed me to tell you that if you 
wanted cash, he was ready to oblige you — ” 

“ He has sent you hither to steal a glance at my knick- 
knacks,” said the old collector, with distrustful acerbity. 

In cases of liver disease, the patient almost invariably 
imbibes some special antipathy for the time being ; he 
concentrates his ill-humor on some particular person or 
thing. Now, Pons imagined that people had designs 
upon his treasure ; and his fixed idea was to keep an eye 
upon it. He would send Schmucke almost every other 
minute to see that no one had slipped into the sanctuary. 

“Your collection is certainly fine enough to attract 
the notice of the chineursfi replied Remonencq, astutely. 
“For my own part, I don’t know much about the curi- 
osity branch of high art, but your reputation as a 
connoisseur, monsieur, stands so high, that, though I 
don’t know much about such matters, I’m quite willing 
to deal with you with my eyes shut. If you should be 
in want of money at any time — for nothing costs so 


208 “a council of corruption.” 

much as these cursed illnesses ; why, there's my sister, 
now, in no more than ten days, spent as much as fifteen- 
pence on physic, when her blood wa^ turned, which she’d 
have got well right enough without it. The doctors are 
swindlers, who take advantage of our condition to — ” 

“Good-bye, monsieur; thank you,” interrupted Pons, 
glancing uneasily at the dealer in old iron. 

“ I’ll go as far as the door with him ; just to see as he 
don’t lay his hand on anything,” said Dame Cibot. 

“Yes, yes,” said Pons, thanking Madame Cibot with a 
look. 

Madame Cibot closed the bedroom door behind her, 
and, by so doing, reawakened all Pons’ suspicions. She 
found Magus standing motionless in front of the four 
pictures. His immobility, his admiration, can be under- 
stood by those only whose minds are open to the beau 
ide'al, and susceptible of those emotions which perfection 
in art is capable of exciting ; by those — and only those — 
who on visiting the museum will stand agaze, for hours 
together, before the “Joconda” of Leonardo da Vinci, 
the “ Antiope ” of Correggio^ — the masterpiece of that 
painter — Titian’s mistress, the “ Holy Family ” of Andrea 
del Sarto, the “ Children surrounded by Flowers,” of 
Domenichino, the little camayeu of Raphael, and his 
“ Portrait of an Old Man,” those greatest masterpieces 
in the whole range of painting. 

“ Steal away without making any noise,” said Madame 
Cibot. 

Thereupon the Jew slowly retreated, walking back- 
ward, and keeping his eyes fixed upon the pictures ; 
just as a lover keeps his eyes fixed upon the mistress to 
whom he bids adieu. When Magus had reached the 
landing, Madame Cibot, in whose brain the Jew’s silent 


“a council of corruption.” 209 

contemplation of the pictures had given rise to certain 
ideas, tapped him on his bony arm, and said : 

“ You must give me four thousand francs for each 
picture ! otherwise nothing can be done — ” 

“ I am so poor,” said Magus. “ If I want to have 
these pictures, it is for the love of them only, purely and 
simply for the love I bear to art, my pretty dame !” 

“You are so lean, my honey, that I can quite, under- 
stand your love for the pictures. But if you don’t 
promise me sixteen thousand francs to-day, in the pres- 
ence of Remonencq here, it’ll be twenty thousand francs 
to-morrow.” 

“ I promise you the sixteen thousand,” replied the 
Jew, terrified at the rapacity of this portress. 

“ What is there as a Jew can swear on ?” quoth Dame 
Cibot to Remonencq. 

“ Oh ! you may trust him,” replied the old-iron dealer ; 
“ he’s as honest a man as I am myself.” 

“ Well then ! and now iox you'' said the portress. “ If 
I get some of the pictures sold to you, what will give 
me ?” 

“ Half my profits,” replied Remonencq, promptly. 

“ I should prefer something down ; I’m not in busi- 
ness,” replied the portress. 

“You seem to understand business uncommonly 
well,” said Elie Magus, with a smile ; “ you would make 
a famous tradeswoman.” 

“ I offer to take her into partnership, person and 
property both,” said the Auvergnat, seizing the plump 
arm of Madame Cibot, and patting it with sledge-ham- 
mer force. “ The only capital I ask for is her good 
looks ! You are wrong to stick to your Turk of a Cibot 
and his needle ! Is it a little porter as can enrich a fine 
woman like you ? Ah ! what a figure you would cut in 


210 “a council of corruption.” 

a shop on the boulevards, surrounded by curiosities, jab- 
bering away to the amateurs and wheedling them out of 
their money ! Turn your back upon the lodge, as soon 
as you’ve feathered your nest here, and you’ll see what 
us two will do between us !” 

“Feathered my nest!” exclaimed Dame Cibot. 
“Why, I’m incapable of taking the worth of a pin ! Do 
you hear what I say, Remonencq ?” cried the portress ; 
“ I’m known in the quarter for an honest woman, yah !” 

As she uttered these words her eyes were all ablaze. 

“There, there! make your mind easy,” said Elie 
Magus. “This Auvergnat looks as if he loved you too 
well to wish to offend you.” 

“Ah! wouldn’t she just know how to manage the 
customers for you !” exclaimed Remonencq. 

“ Now, be just, my little fellows,” rejoined Madame 
Cibot, with returning good temper ; “ and judge for your- 
selves, what my sitiwation here n’is like. Here n’have I 
been a-wearing myself out these ten years for the sake 
of these two old boys, and never received no more than 
a few fine words for my pains. Why, here’s Remon- 
encq’ll tell you, as I feed the two old fellows by contract^ 
and that I loses from twenty to thirty sous a day by it, 
as all my savings have gone that way ; yes, by my 
mother’s soul — which she was the only parient as I ever 
knew — it’s as true as I’m a living woman, as true n’as 
there’s daylight above us at this moment ; and may my 
coffee be my poison if I lie to the tune of one centime ! 
Well, then, here’s one of ’em a-going to die, isn’t there? 
And of these two men, as I’ve been a real mother to, 
he’s the richest ! Well, now, would you believe it, my 
dear sir ; here have I been a-telling of him as he’s a 
dead man, any time this last three weeks (for, you must 
know. Monsieur Poulain has given him up), and yet the 


‘‘a council of coeruption.” 211 

shabby fellow no more says anything n’about mention- 
ing of me in his will than as if I was an n'utter stranger 
to him ! Upon my word and n’honor we never gets our 
dues unless we takes ’em, as I’m an n’honest woman, we 
don’t ; for are you a-going to put any trust in the 
heirs ? — it’s not likely ! Now, just let me tell you — for 
hard words break no bones — all people are scoundrels !” 

“ Right you are,” said Elie Magus, grimly ; “ and ’tis 
we, after all, who are the honest folks.” 

“ Let me have my say,” pursued Dame Cibot ; “ I’m 
not talking about you ; Pressingt persons are always 
accepted ! as the old actor says. I swear to you that 
these two gentlemen n’are already in my debt to the 
tune of about three thousand francs, and that my little 
savings has all gone in medicine and in their concerns, 
and where should I be n’if they wasn’t to repay the 
advances as I’ve made — I’m so stupid with my honesty, 
as I don’t dare to say one word to ’em about the matter. 
Now, you n’as are in business, my dear sir, would you 
advise me to go to an n’advocate ?” 

“An advocate!” cried Remonencq ; “you know a 
great deal more than all the advocasts put together !” 

At this point, the conversation was interrupted by the 
noise caused by the fall of some heavy body upon the 
dining-room floor — a noise that roused the echoes of 
the spacious staircase. 

“ Oh, my God !” exclaimed Dame Cibot, “ what can 
have happened.? It seems to me as it must be Mon- 
sieur Pons as has just taken a ticket for the pit !” 

Thereupon she gave a shove to her two companions, 
who hastily ran down-stairs, while Dame Cibot herself 
darted into the dining-room and there beheld Pons 
stretched at full length upon the flooj, with nothing but 
his night-shirt upon him, and in a swoon ! Taking the 


212 A COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION.-’ 

old bachelor in her arms, she raised him from the floor 
and carried him — light as a feather — to his bed. Hav- 
ing installed the dying man therein, she proceeded to 
restore animation by applying burned feathers to his 
nose and bathing his temples with eau-de-Cologtie. So 
soon as she saw that Pons’ eyes were open, and that 
consciousness was restored, she placed her hands upon 
her hips, and thus began : 

“ Without slippers, and without a rag upon you, except 
your shirt ! Why, it’s enough to give you your death ! 
And wherefore do you mistrust me ? If this is to be the 
game, monsieur, adieii ! After waiting on you for ten 
years, after a-spending my own money on your private 
affairs, which all my savings is gone that way, just to 
save poor Monsieur Schmucke from being worried, 
which the poor man goes up and down-stairs crying like 
a child — this is my reward ! You play the spy — Well ! 
God has punished you for it ; and it serves you right ! 
And me a-straining of myself, to carry you in my arms, 
and a-running the risk of being n’injured for the rest 
o’ my days. Oh ! my God ! And didn’t I leave the 
door open ?” 

“Whom were you talking to?” said Pons. 

“ Now, there’s a pretty notion for a man to take into 
his head !” cried Dame Cibot. “What next, I should 
like to know? Am I your slave? Am I bound to 
account to you for n’everything I do ? Do you know 
that if you worry me n’in this way. I’ll leave you to shift 
for yourself ; and you can just hire a nurse !” 

Terrified by this menace. Pons unwittingly allowed 
Madame Cibot to perceive to what lengths she might go 
armed with that Damoclean sword. 

“ It is only my disease !” said Pons, piteously. 

“Yes, that’s all very fine!” said Madame Cibot, 


213 


A COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION.” 

roughly, marching off and leaving poor Pons alone in 
great perplexity. Remorse, admiration for the clamor- 
ous self-sacrifice of his nurse, and self-accusation, com- 
bined to banish from his mind all consciousness of the 
terrible aggravation of his malady consequent upon his 
fall on the dining-room floor. Madame Cibot met 
Schmucke coming up-stairs, and thus accosted him : 

“Well, monsieur, I’ve got some very bad news to tell 
you, and no mistake. Monsieur Pons is taking leave of 
his senses ! Only fancy ; he got out o’ bed stark naked, 
and followed me, and fell flat upon the floor at full 
length, I do assure you ; ask him why he did it, he 
knows nothing whatever n’about it. He’s in a bad way ; 
I’m sure as I’ve done naught to provoke him to such 
acts of violence ; unless it was as I excited him a bit by 
talking to him n’about his early loves. But then, who 
knows what stuff men are made of? They’re a pack of 
old rakes. I was wrong to show him my arms, which it 
made his eyes glitter like carbuncles. 

Schmucke listened to Madame Cibot as if she were 
talking Hebrew. 

“ I made an n’exertion, which I shall feel it to the end 
of my born days !” added Madame Cibot, pretending to 
be in acute pain ; for it had occurred to her that she 
might make a little capital by acting on an idea that 
had fortuitously presented itself to her when she felt 
that her muscles were a trifle strained. “ I am so 
stupid,” she continued. “ When I saw him a-lying there 
upon the ground, I takes him up in my arms and I 
carries him to his bed, just as if he’d been a child — there 
now ! But now I feel as I’ve strained myself ! Oh ! I 
feel quite ill ! I’m going down to the lodge ; see to our 
patient. I shall send Cibot to fetch Doctor Poulain to 
me ! I’d rather die than be a cripple.” 


21-i ‘‘ A COUNCIL OF CORRUPTION.’’ 

And SO saying, Madame Cibot clutched the balustrade 
and rolled, rather than walked, down-stairs; indulging, 
as she went, in a thousand contortions and in groans so 
heart-rending that the startled occupants of the house 
quitted their respective habitations and thronged the 
landings of the staircase. Schmucke — his eyes stream- 
ing with tears — supported the sufferer and related to the 
on-lookers the story of the portress’ self-sacrifice ; nor 
was it long ere the whole house, nay, the whole neigh- 
borhood was ringing with the sublime exploit of 
Madame Cibot, who — so the rumor ran — had incurred a 
fatal strain by carrying one of the Nut-Crackers in her 
arms. On returning to Pons’ bedside, Schmucke 
informed the invalid of the desperate state of their 
factotum ; whereupon the two friends looked at one 
another, and said: “What will become of us, without 
her?” Schmucke, seeing how much Pons had suffered 
through his escapade, did not venture to scold him. 

“Dat file pric-a-prac ; I would rader purn de whole of 
it dan loze mein friend,” exclaimed he, on learning the 
cause of Pons’ mishap. “ Diztruzt Montame Zibod who 
lends us her zavings ! Dat is not right ; put it is 
de disease — ” 

“Ah ! what a disease it is ! I am changed ; I feel 
that I am,” said Pons. “ I should be sorry to cause you 
any pain, my good Schmucke.” 

“ Grumble at meT said Schmucke, “and leaf Montame 
Zibod in bease.” 

Doctor Poulain made short work of the infirmity with 
which Madame Cibot was, according to her own 
account, threatened ; and this semi-miraculous cure 
added great lustre to his reputation in the Marais. In 
mentioning the matter to Pons, the doctor attributed, 
the cure to the excellent constitution of the patient, who 


“a council of corruption.” 215 

to the intense satisfaction of her two gentlemen, resumed 
her duties, in th^r behalf, on the seventh day after the 
misadventure. The whole event increased the influence 
— the tyranny — of the portress over the establishment 
of the Pair of Nut-Crackers cent, per cent. During her 
seven days absence, they had run into debt. She paid 
the debt, and took advantage of the occasion to obtain 
from Schmucke (ah, how readily !) an acknowledgment 
for the two thousand francs which she represented her- 
self to have lent the two friends. 

“ Ah, what a wonderful doctor Monsieur Poulain is !” 
said Dame Cibot to Pons. “ Depend upon it, he’ll pull 
you through, my dear sir ; for sure enough he’s dragged 
me out of my coffin ! Poor Cibot thought it was all up 
with me ; well, as Monsieur Poulain must have told 
you, when I was a-laying stretched upon my bed I 
thought of nothing but you. ‘Oh, God,’ says I to 
myself, ‘take me^ and let my dear Monsieur Pons live.’” 

“ Poor dear Madame Cibot, you narrowly escaped 
being a cripple on my account.” 

. “ Ah ! yes. If it hadn’t ’a been for Monsieur Poulain, 
I should have been in the deal shift as is a-waiting for 
all of us. Well, well ! we must put up with the conse- 
quences of our n’own folly, as the old actor puts it ! 
We must take things n’as they come, philosophical. 
How did you get on without me V* 

“ Schmucke nursed me,” replied the invalid ; “ but 
our poor nurse, and our connection, suffered in conse- 
quence — I really don’t know how he managed.” 

“ Keeb yourself galm, Bons !” cried Schmucke. 
“ Daddy Zibod agted as our banger.” 

“Oh ! Don’t go for to mention that, my dear lamb ; 
you n’are, both of you, our children,” replied Dame 
Cibot. “ Our savings are in good keeping in your 


216 . “a council of corruption.’^ 

hands, and no mistake. You’re safer nor the Bank of 
France. As long as we’ve a bit of brjead to eat, half of 
it’s yours — the thing isn’t worth speaking about.” 

“ Boor Montame Zibod !” said Schmucke, as he went 
away. But Pons held his peace. 

“ Would you believe now, my cherub,” said Dame 
Cibot to her patient, seeing that he was ill at ease 
“ would you believe that when I was a-dying (for I was 
pretty nigh face to face with Madame Flatnose !) what 
tormented me most was a-leaving of you two alone to 
shift for yourselves, and a-leaving of my poor Cibot 
without a farthing ? My savings is such a mere trifle, 
that I only mention them with reference to my death 
n’and to Cibot, who’s an n’angel ! Ay, that poor 
creature nursed me like a queen, and cried over me like 
a calf. But I trusted to you, on the word of an honest 
woman, I did. Says I to myself: ‘All right, Cibot ; 
my gentlemen’ll never let you want for bread.’ ” 

To this direct appeal ad testamentuin Pons vouchsafed 
no reply ; and the portress waited silently to hear what 
he would say. At length the answer came : 

“ I will recommend you to Schmucke,” said Pons. 

“ Ah !” cried the portress, “ whatever you do will be 
sure to be right ; I puts my faith in you, in your good 
heart. Don’t let’s ever talk about the thing, for you n’hu- 
miliate me, my dear cherub ; think about getting well !” 

Profound was the anxiety which now took possession 
of Madame Cibot ; and she resolved to obtain, from her 
gentleman^ an explicit declaration of his intentions with 
regard to her legacy. Her first step toward carrying 
her resolution into effect, was to sally forth and call upon 
Dr. Poulain that very evening, after Schmucke — who 
since Pons had been taken ill always had his meals by 
his friend’s bedside — had finished dinner. 


A DEBUT AT PAEIS.” 


217 


CHAPTER XVII. 

“ THE HISTORY OF EVERY DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

- Doctor Poulain lived in the Rue d’Orleans, where he 
occupied a small ground floor comprising an anteroom, 
a drawing-room, two bedrooms, a pantry, a kitchen, a 
servant’s room and a little cellar. The pantry, which 
was contiguous to the anteroom, and communicated 
with one of the bedrooms — the doctor’s — had been con- 
verted into a study. This suite of apartments formed 
part of the wing of a house — an enormous pile, built in 
the days of the empire, on the site of an ancient hotel, 
the garden of which still existed and was apportioned 
between the three tenements into which the ground 
floor of the building was divided. 

The rooms inhabited by the doctor had undergone no 
alteration for forty years. Paint, paper, decorations, all 
savored of the imperial epoch. The glasses and their 
frames, the patterns of the paper, the ceilings and the 
paint were dim with smoke and daubed with the accumu- 
lated dirt of forty years. Yet this little habitation in 
the depths of the Marais cost its occupier forty pounds 
a year. 

In the second of the two bedrooms, Mme. Poulain, the 
doctor’s mother, aged sixty-seven, was spending the 
years that yet remained to her. She worked for the 
breeches-makers. She stitched gaiters, leather breeches, 
braces and belts, in short, all the appurtenances of and 
belonging to those now unfashionable garments. 
Occupied as she was with household duties and the 


218 


A DEBUT AT PARIS. 


(( 




superintendence of the only servant that her son 
employed, she never left the precincts of her dwelling, 
but took an occasional airing in the little garden to 
which a glass door in the drawing-room gave access. 
She had now been a widow for twenty years. On the 
death of her husband she sold the good-will and stock 
in trade of her breeches-manufactory to her foreman, 
who reserved for her work enough to enable her to earn 
about fifteenpence a day. Urged by a desire to place 
her only son — no matter at what cost — in a position 
superior to that which his father had occupied, the 
Widow Poulain had shrunk from no sacrifice which 
might further the education of her boy. Proud of her 
^sculapius, and believing in his future success, she 
steadily pursued the path of total self-denial, and found 
her happiness in ministering to her son and laying by 
money for him. Her one day-dream was his welfare, 
and, moreover, she loved him with an intelligent love that 
is beyond the reach of many mothers. Mme. Poulain 
never forgot that she had been a common workwoman ; 
and since the good lady spoke in S, just as Mme. Cibot 
spoke in N, and was loath that her son should be injured 
through any ridicule or contempt that she might excite, 
she would, of her own accord, take refuge in her own 
room when it so happened that any distinguished patient 
came to consult her son ; or when any of his school- 
fellows or hospital companions presented themselves ; 
so that the defective education of the mother — a defect 
that was amply redeemed by her sublime affection for 
her offspring — never raised a blush upon the doctor’s 
cheek. The sale of the good-will and stock in trade of 
the breeches-manufactory had produced some twenty 
thousand francs, which the widow invested in the public 
funds in the year 1820 ; and the dividends, amounting 


219 


‘‘ A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

to eleven hundred francs, constituted her only independ- 
ent means. Under these circumstances, no one will be 
surprised to learn that during many years the widow’s 
neighbors in the Rue d’Orleans were, at certain times 
and seasons, edified by the spectacle of the family linen 
hanging on the clothes-lines in the little garden. The 
servant and Mme. Poulain, between them, did the wash- 
ing at home, at a trifling cost. But this detail of domes- 
tic economy did the doctor a great deal of harm. How 
could so poor a man be a man of talent ? 

The eleven hundred francs were absorbed by house 
rent ; so that, at starting, Mme. Poulain — a stout little 
old woman, with a kind heart — had to meet, out of the 
proceeds of her own unaided industry, all the expenses 
of the humble home. At length, after twelve years 
perseverance in his stony path. Dr. Poulain managed to 
scrape together about three thousand francs a year ; so 
that his mother had an income of about five thousand 
francs with which to make both ends meet. Those who 
know what Paris is, are well aware that such an income 
is just sufficient to procure the necessaries of life. 

The drawing-room (which served as a patient’s wait- 
ing-room) was meanly furnished. It contained the 
inevitable mahogany sofa covered with yellow Utrecht 
velvet, flowered. Add to this four arm-chairs, six 
ordinary chairs, a console and a tea-table, and the 
inventory is complete. All these valuables had been 
selected by the deceased breeches-maker, and formed 
part of his estate at his decease. The time-piece, which 
was never released from its dome of glass, was in the 
form of a lyre, and was flanked by a pair of Egyptian 
candelabra. To what process of preservation the 
window-curtains of this apartment had been subjected, 
was a question which forced itself upon the observer ; 


220 


A DEBUT AT PAKIS.” 

but that they had contrived to hang together for a period 
of abnormal length was obvious from their texture and 
their pattern ; they were of yellow calico stamped with 
red roses, ^nd came from the manufactory at Jouy. Now, 
it was in the year 1809 that Obercampf received the 
compliments of the Emperor on account of these 
atrocious products of the cotton trade ! The doctor’s 
study was furnished in the same style, with furniture 
that had already seen service in the paternal chamber, 
and gave the room a meager, chilly, poverty-stricken 
aspect. Now, in this age, when the advertisement is all- 
powerful, when we gild the lamp-posts in the Place de 
la Concorde, in order that the pauper may fancy him- 
self a wealthy citizen, and find comfort in the illusion, 
what patient will believe in the skill of a physician who 
has neither fame nor — furniture ? 

The antechamber was used as a dining-room ; and 
the servant worked in it, when not engaged in the dis- 
charge of her culinary functions, or in relieving the 
solitude of the doctor’s mother. Enter this room, and 
a glance at the scanty sand-colored muslin curtains of 
the window, which looks on the court, revealed to you 
the decent penury that reigned in this drear abode, 
which was a desert during half the day. Those cup- 
boards piusf conceal the moldy pdte^ the chipped plate, 
the immemorial cork, the napkin that has done duty for 
a week ; in short, all those venial ignominies that are to 
be found in small Parisian households, and thence find 
their way, directly, to the ragman’s creel. Under these 
circumstances, and in these days when the crown-piece 
nestles at the bottom of every heart, and rings in every 
phrase that is uttered, the doctor, who was now thirty, 
and had a mother without connections of any kind, very 
naturally remained unmarried. In his intercourse with 


221 


“a debut at PARIS.” 

the various families to which his professional duties 
introduced him, he had never — throughout ten long 
years — encountered even the slightest foundation for a 
castle in the air ; for the people whom Dr. Poulain 
attended occupied a sphere in which the daily routine 
of existence was similar to that to which he himself was 
accustomed. The only establishments he saw — those of 
minor clerks and petty manufacturers — resembled his 
own establishment. His richest patients were the 
butchers, the bakers, the large retail dealers of the dis- 
trict ; and these good people generally imputed their 
recovery to the operations of Dame Nature, in order to 
reduce to a couple of shillings the fee of the doctor who 
came to visit them on foot. In the medical profession 
the carriage is more important than the cure. 

A commonplace and uneventful life tells, in the long 
run, upon the most adventurous spirit. A man molds 
himself to the shape required by his lot, and accepts 
the yoke of a humdrum existence. Thus, after a ten 
years practice of his profession. Dr. Poulain pursued 
his Sisyphean calling without feeling the extreme 
dejection that, in the earlier portion of his career, had 
filled his cup with bitterness. Yet he, too, had his day- 
dream. At Paris every person has a day-dream. 
Remonencq had his day-dream ; Mme. Cibot hers. Dr. 
Poulain’s day-dream took the form of a hope that he 
might be summoned to the sick-bed of some wealthy 
and powerful patient, and obtain through the influence 
of this patron-patient — whom he would of course succeed 
iu curing — the post of chief physician to a hospital, or 
of physician in ordinary to a prison, or a boulevard 
theater, or a government office. It was in this way, 
indeed, that he had procured his appointment as a 
physician to the ntairie. Introduced by Mme. Cibot, he 


222 “ A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

had attended and cured M. Pillerault, the owner of the 
house to which the Cibots were attached as porters. 
M. Pillerault, who was granduncle, on the mother’s side 
to the Countess Popinot, the wife of the minister, 
became interested in the fortunes of the young doctor, 
whose hidden penury the old man had fathomed when 
he went to thank the physician for his attentions. 
Actuated by this feeling, M. Pillerault induced his 
grandnephew the minister — who adored his old uncle — 
to give Dr. Poulain the berth which he had now occu- 
pied for five years. The slender emoluments of this 
office came just in the very nick of time to prevent the 
doctor from resorting to that desperate measure — emi- 
gration ; which, to a Frenchman, is almost as bad as 
death. Dr. Poulain took good care to pay Count Popi- 
not a visit of acknowledgment, but finding that, that 
statesman’s medical attendant was the illustrious 
Bianchon, the poor doctor fully understood that to 
solicit employment in that quarter would be a very 
hopeless enterprise. After having nursed the flattering 
hope of securing the patronage of an influential minis- 
ter — one of those twelve or fifteen great cards that, dur- 
ing the last sixteen years, a powerful hand has been 
shuffling on the green cloth of the council-table — Dr. 
Poulain found himself once more immersed in the 
Marais, and doomed to potter about among the small 
tradesmen and the poor of the district, and to act as 
registrar of deaths at a salary of twelve hundred francs 
per annum. 

Dr. Poulain, who had distinguished himself as a resi- 
dent medical student, and had developed into a careful 
practitioner, by no means lacked experience. Moreover, 
if his patients died, their death gave rise to no scandal ; 
and he had an opportunity of studying every species of 


223 


DEBUT AT PAEIS.^^ 

disease hianimd vili. You may readily imagine on what 
a regimen of gall he lived ! And accordingly, the 
expression of his face — a face which was naturally long 
and melancholy — was, sometimes, positively fearful. 
Picture to yourself the eyes of Tartuffe glittering 
through a mask of yellow parchment, stamped with all 
the bitterness of Alceste ; picture to yourself the bear- 
ing, the attitude, and the glance of this man, who, know’’- 
ing that he was quite as good a doctor as the illustrious 
Bianchon, found himself fixed in an obscure position by 
a hand of iron. Dr. Poulain could not help comparing 
his gains — which even on lucky days did not exceed ten 
francs — with those of Bianchon who made his five or 
six hundred francs per diem ! That reflection will 
explain all that envious hate that seethes in the bosom 
of the democrat. Nor could this victim of repressed 
ambition charge himself with any remissness. He had 
already tried to make a fortune by the invention of 
purgative pilules resembling those of Morison. He had 
intrusted the working of this speculation to one of his 
fellow-students, a resident student who had turned 
druggist. But this druggist fell in love with a ballet- 
girl at the opera, and became a bankrupt, and the pat- 
ent of invention for the purgative pilules, having been 
taken out in his name, the magnificent discovery went 
to enrich his successor. The former resident student 
scampered off to Mexico — the land of gold — taking with 
him a thousand francs of poor Poulain’s savings ; and 
when the poor fellow went to the figurante to ask for 
his money, she treated him — by way of consolation 
stakes — as if he had been a money-lender. Since Pou- 
lain had had the good fortune to cure old Pillerault, his 
services had not been sought by any wealthy patient. 
So he had to run about the Marais on foot, like a hun- 


224 


‘‘ A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

gry cat, and, in a round of twenty visits, would find 
only two that yielded him a fee of forty sous apiece. 
To him the liberal patient was that fairy bird which, in 
every region under the sun, goes by the name of the 
white blackbird. 

The young briefless barrister, the young doctor with- 
out connection, are the two most striking personifications 
of that genteel Despair which is peculiar to Paris — that 
chilly dumb Despair that walks about clad in black coat 
and trousers, whose shiny seams recall the zinc that 
roofs the attic in which it hides. The well-worn satin 
waistcoat, the well-saved hat, old gloves and calico shirt, 
complete the livery. ’Tis a perfect poem of misery, as 
sombre as the secret cells of the Conciergerie. The 
penury of others — of the poet, the artist, the actor, the 
musician — is relieved by the gayety that Art brings in 
her train, and by the lightheartedness which prevails 
throughout Bohemia — that avenue to the Thebaides of 
genius ; but the features of these two black-coated 
figures, that steal about on foot, and belong to two pro- 
fessions whose members live by the sufferings of human- 
ity and see only its weaker and its baser sides — the 
features of the struggling barrister and struggling 
doctor — are frequently marked by a defiant and sinister 
expression, and reveal their mingled hatred of the 
wealthy and eagerness for wealth in glances that dart 
from their eyes like the first tongues of flame emitted by 
a smoldering conflagration. When two men, who were 
friends at school, encounter one another after an interval 
of twenty years, the rich one shuns the pauper who was 
once his uomrade, does not recognize him, shudders at 
the thought of the abyss that destiny has placed between 
them. The one has traveled through life, borne along 
by Fortune’s prancing steeds or throned on the golden 







DOCTOR POULAiN REFLECTING.— -S'ee Page 228. 





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225 


A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

clouds of triumph ; the other has plodded his weary 
way through subterraneous paths, “ the common shores ” 
of Paris, and is stained with all their “ sable tokens.” 
Ah ! how many of Dr. Poulain’s former friends avoided 
him at the sight of that waistcoat and that coat. 

The reader will now find ho difficulty in understanding 
why Dr. Poulain played his part so perfectly in the little 
comedy which might be entitled : “ Dame Cibot’s peril.” 
All greeds and all ambitions have a freemasonry of their 
own. When the doctor not only failed to discover any 
organic lesion of any kind in Mme. Cibot, but found 
that her pulse was admirably regular, and that her 
movements were entirely free from constraint, and yet 
heard her screaming as if in pain, he saw at once that 
she had a motive for pretending to be at the point of 
death. Knowing that the speedy cure of a serious 
(imaginary) illness would cause his name to be talked 
about in the arrondissement, he exaggerated Mme. 
Cibot’s visionary rupture and talked about reducing it 
by taking it in time. In short, he administered fictitious 
remedies, and performed a fantastic operation, which 
were crowned with complete success. Having ransacked 
the arsenal of Desplein’s extraordinary cures, and hit 
upon an out-of-the-way case, he proceeded to treat Mme. 
Cibot by the same method, modestly gave the credit of 
its successful issue to the eminent surgeon, and repre- 
sented himself as his imitator. Such is the audacity of 
the Parisian debutant ! He turns everything into a 
ladder, wherewith to reach his theatre of action. But 
since all things — even the rungs of a ladder — wear out 
in time, the aspirants of every profession are at their 
wit’s end for wood to make steps with. At certain times 
the Parisian mutinies against success. Tired of erect- 
ing pedestals, he sulks like a spoiled child, and resolves 


226 


“ A DEBUT AT PAKIS.’’ 

to have no more idols ; or, to be strictly accurate, men 
of talent are not always forthcoming to feed his 
infatuation. There are faults in the veins that supply 
us with men of genius. When such a fault occurs the 
Parisian begins to kick ; he is not content to be always 
adorning or adoring mediocrity. 

When Mme. Cibot, with her habitual brusqueness, 
bounced into the -doctor’s dining-room, she surprised 
him and his aged mother at the dinner-table discussing 
a corn-salad — the cheapest of all salads — while their 
dessert was limited to an acute-angled triangle of Brie 
cheese which was flanked on one side by a dish contain- 
ing a meagre supply of figs, filberts, almonds, and raisins 
(commonly called les quatre-mendiants) and a plentiful 
supply of raisin-stalks, and on the other side by a dish 
of common apples. 

“ You need not go away, mother,” said the doctor, 
detaining Mme. Poulain by placing his hand upon-her 
arm ; “ this is Madame Cibot, of whom 3^ou have heard 
me speak.” 

“ My respects to you, madame ; my duty to you, 
monsieur,” said Dame Cibot, as she seated herself in 
the chair which the doctor offered her. “ Ah ! this good 
lady is your mother ; she’s most fortunate in having 
such a clever son ; for he’s my savior, madame ; he 
pulled me n’out of the pit of — ” 

When the widow heard this eulogy upon her son from 
the lips of the portress, she thought Mme. Cibot a 
charming person. 

“ Well, it’s to tell you, dear Doctor Poulain, between 
ourselves, as poor Monsieur Pons is a-going on very 
badly indeed, and I want to have a word with you in 
relation to him — ” 

“Let us go into the drawing-room,” said Dr. Poulain, 


227 


A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

intimating to Mme. Cibot, by a significant gesture, that 
the servant was present. 

So soon as Mme. Cibot was in the drawing-room she 
entered into a lengthy exposition of her relations with 
the Pair of Nut-Crackers ; she repeated, with divers 
embellishments, the story of her loan to them, and 
recounted the immense services which she had rendered 
to Messrs. Pons and Schmucke during the last ten years. 
According to her showing, those two old men would not 
have been alive but for her maternal care. She posed 
as an angel and told so many tear-besprinkled false- 
hoods that at length old Mme. Poulain became deeply 
affected. 

“You understand, my dear sir,” said Mme. Cibot, in 
conclusion, “ as it’s highly n’important I should know 
n’exactly what Monsieur Pons intends to do for me in 
case he should happen to die; which of course I don’t 
want him so to do scarcely ; for you see, madame, look- 
ing after these two innocents is my very life ; but if one 
of them goes I’ll look after the other. Nature built me 
for the rival of 7naternity. If I hadn’t some one to take 
an n’interest in and to make a child of I don’t know 
whatever would become o’ me. Well, then, if Monsieur 
Poulain was willing he might do me a service, as I should 
be very grateful for, by putting in a word for me with 
Monsieur Pons. My God ! a thousand francs a year for 
life, is that too much, I should like to know? It ’ud be 
just so much in Monsieur Schmucke’s pocket. Well, 
now, our dear invalid told me as he’d recommend me to 
this poor German, who, therefore, n’according to his 
idea, would be his heir. But What can one do with a 
man as can’t tack two ideas together in French, and who, 
besides, may take it into his head to run off to Germany ; 
he’ll be so'cut up by the death of his friend ?” 


228 


“a debut at PARIS.’’ 

“My dear Madame Cibot,” replied the doctor, whose 
face now wore a very solemn aspect, “doctors have 
nothing whatever to do with such matters as you have 
mentioned, and I should be suspended from the practice 
of my profession if it were known that I had meddled 
with the testamentary arrangements of one of my 
patients. The law forbids a doctor to accept a legacy 
from his patient — ” 

“ What a fool of a law ! for what is there to hinder me 
from sharing my legacy with you ?” replied Dame 
Cibot, without a moment’s hesitation. 

“ I will go yet further,” said the doctor ; “ my con- 
science as a medical man forbids me to talk to Monsieur 
Pons about his death. In the first place, his position is 
not sufficiently critical for that ; and, in the second, such 
language coming from me would cause him a shock that 
might do him substantial injury and so render his case 
desperate.” 

“ But I make no bones about telling him to set his 
affairs in order — and n’it makes him not a penny the 
worse. He’s accustomed to it ! You needn’t be afraid,” 
said Mme. Cibot. 

“Don’t say another word to me upon the subject, my 
dear Madame Cibot ! Matters of this kind are not 
within the province of the physician ; they are for the 
notary — ” 

“ But, my dear Monsieur Poulain, suppose as Monsieur 
Pons was to ask you how he is of his own n’accord, and 
whether he would do well to take his precautions. That 
bein-gso, would you refuse to tell him as it’s a n’excellent 
way to get well again to n’have all your affairs ship- 
shape ? Then you might just slip in one little word 
about me — ” 

“ Oh ! if he begins talking to me about making his 


229 


“ A DEBUT AT PARIS.’’ 

will, I shall not dissuade him from doing so,” said Dr. 
Poulain. 

“ Well, then, that matter’s settled !” cried Mme. Cibot. 
“ I came to thank you for the trouble you took in my 
case,” she added, slipping into the doctor’s hand a 
curl-paper containing three pieces of gold. “ That’s all 
as I’m able to do just now. Ah ! if I was only rich you 
should be rich too, dear Doctor Poulain ; you n’as is the 
image of the good God on earth — Ah ! madame, you’ve 
got an n’angel for a son.” 

So saying. Dame Cibot rose ; Mme. Poulain bowed to 
her in high good-humor, and the doctor escorted her as 
far as the landing. There this fearful Lady Macbeth of 
the street was enlightened by a ray of intelligence that 
came direct from hell. She perceived that the doctor 
must be her accomplice since he accepted an honorarium 
for the cure of a simulated malady. 

“ Why, my dear Monsieur Poulain,” she said to him ; 
“ after having pulled me round after my accident, would 
you decline to save me from want by saying of a few 
w’ords 

The doctor felt that he had allowed the devil to get 
hold of one of his hairs, and that that hair was being 
twisted round the ruthless horn of the red claw. 
Startled by the notion of losing his integrity for so mere 
a trifle, he responded to Dame Cibot’s diabolical sug- 
gestion by another equally diabolical. 

“ Listen to me, my dear Mme. Cibot,” said he, taking 
the good lady back irtto his appartments and conduct- 
ing her to his study. “ I am about to pay the debt of 
gratitude I owe you for having got me my post at the 
7nairie — ” 

“We will go shares,” said Mme. Cibot, emphatically. 

“ In what?” asked the doctor. 


230 


‘‘ A DE:BUT at PARIS.” 

“ In the old man’s fortune,” replied the portress. 

“You evidently don’t know me,” replied the doctor, pos- 
ing as Valerius Publicola. “ Don’t mention thatsubject 
to me again. I have an old school-fellow, a very clever 
young man, who is all the more friendly toward me 
because our lot in life has been the same. While I was 
studying medicine he was learning law ; while I was a 
resident student at the hospital, he was engrossing deeds 
in the office of a solicitor, Maitre Couture. His father 
was a shoe-maker, just as mine was a manufacturer of 
breeches ; so, you may be sure, he did not meet with 
much sympathy from those about him ; and, what is 
more, he found no capital ; for after all, it is only through 
exciting sympathy that one gets capital. The best he 
could do was to treat for a provincial practice at Mantes. 
Now, so little do provincial folks understand a Parisian 
intellect that my friend was constantly in hot water 
among them — ” 

“The scoundrels !” exclaimed Mme. Cibot. 

“Yes,” pursued the doctor ; “for the good people of 
Mantes combined against him with such effect that he 
was forced to sell his practice on account of some matters 
that were misrepresented so as to make him appear to be 
in the wrong ; the king’s attorney interfered ; he 
belonged to the neighborhood, and made common cause 
with the natives of the place. This poor young man, 
whose name is Fraisier, who is even more lean and more 
threadbare than I am, and has no better house over his 
head, has taken refuge in our arrondissement. He is 
obliged to plead — for he is an advocate — before the Juge 
de paix^ and in the ordinary police-courts. He lives close 
by — in the Rue de la Perle. If you go to number nine, 
and mount to the third story, you will see, when you 
reach the landing, the word CABINET DE MONSIEUR 


A DEBUT AT PARIS. 


231 


Cl 

FR AISIER, in gilt letters on a little square of red morocco. 
Fraisier’s business is almost exclusively confined to the 
litigation of the porters, the artisans and the poor inhabi- 
tants of our arrondissement. His charges are very mod- 
erate. He is a man honor ; for I need hardly tell you that 
with his abilities, he would now be driving his carriage if 
he were a rogue. I shall see my friend F raisier this even- 
7 go to him early to-morrow morning. He knows 
Monsieur Louchard the bum-bailiff, Monsieur Tabareau 
the bailiff of the Justice de paix^ Monsieur Vitel the Jugede 
paix^ and Monsieur Trognon the notary. He has already 
won a position among the most reputable professional 
men of the district. If he undertakes your business and 
you can get him to act as Monsieur Pons’ legal adviser, 
you will find in him, I can assure you, a second self. 
Only, let me warn you not to propose to him, as you did 
to me, a mutual agreement of a dishonorable character ; 
at the same time, I may tell you that he is an intelligent 
man, and that you and he will be able to come to some 
understanding. Then, as regards the remuneration of 
his services, I will act as your intermediary — ” 

Mme. Cibot looked at the doctor with a knowing hook 
and inquired : 

“ Isn’t he the legal gentleman as pulled Madame Flori- 
mond, what keeps the haberdasher’s shop in the Rue 
Vieille du Temple, out of the mess as she got into over 
the estate of the gentleman what — ” 

“ That’s the very man,” said the doctor. 

“N’isn’t it a shame,” cried Mme. Cibot, “ that after 
he’d been and gone and got her a n’incomeof two thous- 
and francs she should have gone and jilted him when 
he n’asked her to marry him, and should have thought 
as she was quits with him (as they say she did) by giv- 


232 ‘^A DEBUT AT PARIS.” 

ing him a dozen holland shirts, two dozen handker- 
chiefs, and — in short, a n’outfit !” 

“ My dear Madame Cibot,” repljed the doctor, “ the 
outfit you speak of costa thousand francs ; and Fraisier, 
who was at that time just commencing business in this 
district, was sadly in want of an outfit. Besides, 
Madame Florimond paid his bill of costs without cavil- 
ing at a single item ; and that piece of business was the 
means of bringing Fraisier a good many other clients ; 
so that he has his hands quite full of business now ; 
though, I must admit, it is of much the same description 
as my own — there isn't much to choose between his con- 
nection and mine — ” 

“ It is only the just as suffers here below !” replied 
the portress. “Well, good-bye and thank you, my dear 
Monsieur Poulain.” 

And now begins the drama — or (if you will) the tragi- 
comedy — of the death of an old bachelor who, by the 
irresistible force of circumstances, has become the help- 
less prey of the avaricious beings now grouped around 
his dying bed. Leagued and allied with them are the 
keenest of all passions — the passion of the picture- 
maniac, the greed of Fraisier (the portrait of whom, as 
he appeared in his den, will make you shudder), and 
the thirst for gold of an Auvergnat, who, to become a 
capitalist, was prepared for anything, even crime. This, 
the earlier portion of my narrative serves, in some sort, 
as an introduction to this tragi-comedy, while the 
dramatis persona include all the characters who have 
hitherto occupied the stage. 


“ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 




CHAPTER XVIII. 

“an HOMME DE LOI.” 

Among odd freaks of custom, the debasement of 
words is one that would require volumes for its explana- 
tion. Write to a solicitor, styling him a. homme de lot, 
and you will offend him as gravely as you would a 
colonial merchant were you to send him a letter ad- 
dressed : Monsieur So-and-so, Grocer. There are a 
great many men of the world — and they surely ought 
to be perfectly familiar with these subtle technicalities 
of the art of living ; since, if they are ignorant of these, 
they are ignorant of all things — who are entirely una- 
ware that to call an author a homnie de lettres is the most 
galling insult that you can offer him. The word mon- 
sieur is the most striking example of the life and death 
of words. Monsieur means monseigneur. This title, 
monsieur, which was formerly so important (and is still, 
when transformed from sieur into sire^ reserved exclu- 
sively for monarchs), is now applied to everybody ; 
although, strange to say, messire (which is nothing 
more than the word monsieur doubled, and is its equiv- 
alent) provokes indignant articles in the Republican 
journals when it occurs in an invitation to a funeral. 
Magistrats^ conseillers^ jurisco?isultes^ Juges, avocats^ officiers^ 
ministeriels^ avoues^ huissiers^ conseils^ hommes d'affaires^ agents 
d'affaires and ddfenseurs — such are the various species into 
which the class of persons who administer the law and 
carry its decisions into operation are divided. The two 
lowest rungs of this legal ladder are the practicien and 


234 “ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

the homme de loi. The practicien^ who is vulgarly called re- 
cors (bum-bailiff), is the fortuitous homme de justice ; his 
office is to assist in the execution of the sentence in a 
civil suit ; he may be called the casual common hang- 
man of the civil courts. As for the homme de loi^ he is 
the very opprobrium of the profession. He is in the 
legal what the homme de lettres is in the literary world. 
The competition which consumes every profession in 
France has invented a corresponding set of disparaging 
terms. Every vocation has its appropriate stigma. The 
contempt which brands the expressions homme de lettres 
and homme de loi does not, however, extend to their 
plurals. One may use the terms les gens de lettres^ les gens 
de loi, without wounding anybody’s feelings. But to 
resume ; at Paris each profession has its Omegas — persons 
who lower the calling to the level of the streets — the level 
of the lowest ranks. The hoimne de loi, the pettifogging 
agent, accordingly still exists in certain quarters of the 
town ; just as the market has its petty usurer who 
stands in the same relative position to the princes of 
the banking world as M. Fraisier did to the Society of 
Avou6s. Strange as it may seem, the common people 
are as reluctant to resort to the ministerial officers of 
the law as they are to enter a fashionable restaurant ; 
on the other hand, they repair to the agent as readily 
as to the pot-house. There is one general law for every 
social sphere — the law of equality. It is only the 
choicest spirits that delight in scaling the summits of 
society ; who do not suffer when they find themselves 
in the presence of their superiors ; who make good their 
footing much as Beaumarchais secured his, by dropping 
the watch of the grand seigneur who was trying to make 
him feel his inferiority. Hence, the successful adven- 
turer, especially the adventurer who leaves behind him 


AN HOMME HE LOl/’ 


235 


every fragment of the swaddling clothes in which he 
once was wrapped, is a colossal exception to the general 
rule. 

Six o’clock the next morning found Mme. Cibot in the 
Rue de la Perle examining the house which sheltered her 
future legal adviser, the Sieur Fraisier, the hofnnie de loi. 
It was one of those old houses which XhQ petite bourgeoisie 
of by-gone days used to live in. The entrance to the 
house lay through a passage. The ground floor (part of 
which was taken up by the porter’s lodge and by the 
shop of a cabinet-maker whose work-rooms and ware- 
houses trenched upon a small interior court) was cut in 
two by the passage and the staircase, whose walls were 
so damp and so incrusted with saltpetre that the house 
appeared to be suffering from leprosy. 

Mme. Cibot went straight to the lodge, where she 
found one of Cibot’s brother-porters — a shoe-maker — 
together with his wife and two young children, all 
packed into a space of ten feet square, which was lighted 
only by a window looking on to the little court. When 
once Dame Cibot had announced her name and calling, 
and mentioned her house in the Rue de Normandie, it 
was not long ere a thorough understanding was estab- 
lished between the two women. After a quarter of an 
hour’s gossip, during which M. Fraisier’s portress was 
preparing breakfast for the shoe-maker and the two 
children, Mme. Cibot turned the conversation on to the 
subject of the inmates of the house, and mentioned the 
homme de loi. 

“I am come to consult him on business,” said she ; 
“one of his friends. Doctor Poulain, said as he would 
mention my name to Monsieur Fraisier. You know 
Doctor Poulain, don’t you ?” 

“ I should think I did !” said the portress of the Rue 


236 


AN HOMME DE LOT.” 

de la Perle. “He saved my little girl when she had the 
croup.” 

“ Ay, and he saved me too, madame. What sort of a 
man might this Monsieur Fraisier be ?” 

“ He’s a man from whom we find it no easy matter to 
get the money we’ve paid for the postage of his letters 
when the end of the month comes, my good lady.” 

The intelligent Dame Cibot required no further 
answer. 

“ It’s possible to be poor and n’honest,” said she. 

“I should hope so,” replied Fraisier’s portress; “ 
are not rolling in gold or silver, no, nor yet in copper, 
neither ; but we don’t owe a farthing to any soul alive.” 

This was a kind of language which Mme. Cibot was 
quite at home in. 

“Well, my dear,” she pursued, “ I suppose I can trust 
him, can’t I ?” 

“ Ah, indeed you can ; when Monsieur Fraisier wants 
to do any one a good turn. I’ve heard Madame Flori- 
mond say that he hasn’t his fellow — ” 

“Then, why didn’t she marry him?” asked Dame 
Cibot, with emphasis, “ since she owed her fortune to 
him ? It’s something for a woman as keeps a small 
haberdasher’s shop to become the wife of a n’advo- 
cate — ” 

“Why, indeed?” said the portress, as she led Mme. 
Cibot into the passage. “ You are going up to see him, 
aren’t you, madame ? Well ! when you get into his 
room you’ll know the reason why !” 

The staircase, which was lighted by sash-windows 
looking on to a small court, revealed the fact that, with 
the exception of the landlord and the Sieur Fraisier, the 
inmates of the house were engaged in mechanical 
occupations. The muddy stairs, strewn with shreds of 


287 


AN HOMMK DE LOI.” 

copper, broken buttons, scraps of gauze, and fragments 
of esparto grass, disclosed the nature of the several 
trades that were carried on in the house, while the 
walls of the upper stories were disfigured with obscene 
caricatures — the handiwork of the apprentices. 

The last words of the portress had excited Mme. 
Cibot’s curiosity, and had thus naturally determined her 
to consult Dr. Poulain's friend. Whether she should 
employ him or not was a question, the decision of which 
she reserved until she had seen him. 

“I sometimes ask myself how Madame Sauvage can 
bear to remain in his service,” said the portress, by way 
of commentary, as she followed Mme. Cibot up-stairs ; 

I am going up with you, madame,” she added, “ for 
I am taking the landlord’s milk and his newspaper up 
to his apartments.” 

On reaching the second story above the entresol. 
Dame Cibot found herself before a most disreputable- 
looking door of a dubious red color, and incaked to the 
width of about two inches and a half with that dark- 
brown layer of dirt that results from the oft-repeated 
application of the hand, and forms an eye-sore which 
the architect has endeavored to banish from elegant 
apartments by placing plates of glass above and below 
the key-holes. The wicket of this door was so clogged 
with rubbish resembling that which restaurateurs have 
devised in order to give an appearance of age to bottles 
which are still in their teens, that it served no other 
end than that of procuring for the door the nickname 
of prison-door — a nickname, by the way, that was 
thoroughly in keeping with the club-shaped iron bind- 
ings, formidable hinges and large-headed nails with 
which the door was garnished. These appendages must 


238 “ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

have been invented by some miser or by some pamphlet- 
eer at feud with the whole world. 

The leaden sink which received the slops of Monsieur 
Fraisier's establishment, contributed its quota to the 
stenches of the staircase, the ceiling of which was 
wreathed with arabesques of lampblack ; and marvelous 
arabesques indeed they were ! When Mme. Cibot 
pulled the greasy olive-shaped handle of the door-bell 
its faint tinkle showed that the bell-metal was cracked. 
Indeed, every object was in perfect harmony with the 
broad outlines of this hideous picture. The sound of 
heavy footsteps and the asthmatic breathing of a portly 
woman now fell upon the ear of Mme. Cibot, and lo ! 
Mme. Sauvage appeared ! Mme. Sauvage was exactly 
like one of those old hags whom Adrien Brauvver has 
invented for his “ Witches Starting for the Sabbath.” 
She was five feet six; her face had a military aspect, 
and was far more hairy than -Dame Cibot’s. Mme. 
Sauvage was morbidly stout, wore a hideous dress of 
cheap cotton, wrapped her head in a turban, still put 
her hair in curl-papers made out of the printed circu- 
lars received by her employer, and adorned her ears 
with rings or rather cartwheels of gold. This female 
Cerberus held in her hand a battered tin saucepan. The 
various odors of the staircase received an addition to 
their number from the spilled milk ; but this last odor, 
in spite of its sickening acridity, was almost impercepti- 
ble among so many stinks. 

“And what might your pleasure be, medeme ?” 
inquired Mme. Sauvage ; and as she put the question, 
the murderous look she cast at Mme. Cibot was intensi- 
fied by the appearance of her chronically bloodshot 
eyes. The fact is that Dame Cibot was too well dressed 
to please Mme. Sauvage. 


239 


“ AN HOMMB DE LOI.” 

“Monsieur Fraisier’s friend, Doctor Poulain, has sent 
me here to see Monsieur Fraisier.” 

“ Walk in, medeme,” replied Dame Sauvage, with a 
sudden access of politeness, which showed that she had 
been forwarned of this early call. And, after having 
dropped a theatrical courtesy, the semi-masculine ser- 
vant of Sieur Fraisier abruptly threw open the door of 
the study that looked on to the street, and in which the 
quondam solicitor of Mantes was seated. 

This study was an exact counterpart of those small 
offices 6f third-rate bailiffs where the pigeon-holes are 
of blackened wood, where the papers have lain so long 
undisturbed that, in the language of the clerks’ room, 
they have grown beards ; where the red tape droops 
dejectedly ; where the paper-cases bear traces of the 
gambols of mice, while the floor is gray with dust, and 
the ceiling yellow with smoke. 

All tarnished was the pier-glass in M. Fraisier’s study, 
and meagre was the log of wood that rested on the cast 
iron fire-dogs. The time-piece, of modern marquetry 
work, had evidently been picked up at some execution 
sale, and was worth about sixty francs. The design of 
the chimney-candlesticks that flanked the time-piece was 
a clumsy rococo, and the zinc of which they were com- 
poned peeped through its coat of paint in several places. 
M. Fraisier himself was a lean, unhealthy little man 
with a rubicund face, whose pustules betrayed the 
unwholesome condition of his blood. He had an invet- 
erate habit of scatching his right arm, and his wig was 
placed so far back upon his head as to disclose a large 
area of brick-colored cranium of most forbidding 
aspect. On Mme. Cibot’s entrance Fraisier rose from 
the cane arm-chair in which he was sitting on a round 
cushion of green morocco, and assuming an engaging 


2 . 1:0 


AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

air and a honeyed tone of voice, remarked, as he 
brought forward a chair : “ Madame Cibot, I believe ?” 

“ Yes, monsieur,” replied the portress, whose ordinary 
self-possession had entirely deserted her. She was 
daunted by the timbre of his voice, which was not 
unlike that of the door-bell, and by a glance that was 
greener even than the greenish eyes of her future coun- 
sel. The study stunk so strongly of its occupant that 
its atmosphere well might be deemed to be pestiferous. 
Mme. Cibot was now no longer at a loss to understand 
why Mme. Florimond had declined the honor of becom- 
ing Mme. Fraisier. 

“ Poulain has mentioned your name to me, my dear 
madame,” said the homme de /oi, in that affected voice 
which is popularly called voix, and which, in spite 

of all his efforts to soften it, remained harsh and thin as 
common country wine. 

As he uttered these words, the man of law endeavored 
to adjust his habiliments by drawing the skirts of his 
dressing-gown over his bony knees, which were cased in 
excessively threadbare swanskin. The dressing-gown 
in question was old, and here and there its lining imper- 
tinently peered through the rents in the printed calico 
of which it was made. In spite of Fraisier’s efforts the 
weight of the lining dragged the skirts of the gown 
apart, and thus exposed to view a close-fitting flannel 
vest, black with long wear. With a somewhat coxcomb- 
ical air, Fraisier proceeded to tie the cord of the refrac- 
tory dressing-gown tightly round his waist, so as to dis- 
play his reed-like figure ; then taking up the tongs, he 
effected a junction between a pair of brands that, like 
two brothers who have had a quarrel, had long been 
disunited ; then finally, as if some thought had suddenly 


241 


“ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

occurred to him, he jumped up from his seat and called 
out : 

“ Madame Sauvage !” 

“ Well, what is it 

“ I am not at home to anybody.” 

“ Well, by gad, you needn’t tell me that,” replied that 
virago, in a commanding tone of voice. 

“ It is my old wet-nurse,” said the disconcerted man 
of law. 

“ Old and inweterate ugly still,” replied the ex-heroine 
of the market. 

Fraisier laughed at the pun, and proceeded to bolt the 
door, in order that his housekeeper might not come in 
and interrupt Dame Cibot’s confidential communica- 
tions. 

“Well, madame, will you be good enough to explain 
your business to me,” said Fraisier, seating himself, and 
still endeavoring to adjust his dressing-gown. “ A 
person who comes to me with a recommendation from 
the only friend I have in the world, may rely upon me — 
ay — implicitly.” 

Mme. Cibot harangued for a quarter of an hour with- 
out any, even the slightest, interruption, from the man 
of law, whose air was precisely that of a recruit listen-' 
ing, with both ears, to a veteran of the old guard. This 
silence and submissiveness on the part of Fraisier, and 
the attention which he paid to the cataract of talk (of 
which we have had samples in the scenes between Cibot 
and poor Pons) induced the suspicious portress to lay 
aside some of the prejudice which so many repulsive 
details had instilled into her mind. When, at length, 
she had finished her narrative and was waiting for some 
advice, the little lawyer, who all this time had been 
studying his future client with his green, black-speckled 


242 


“ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

eyes, was seized with a church-yard cough, and was 
obliged to have recourse to a delf bowl half full of 
herb-juice, which he completely drained. 

“ But for Poulain I should, ere now, have been in my 
grave, my dear Madame Cibot,” remarked Fraisier, by 
way of answer to the motherly glances of the portress ; 
“ but he tells me he will restore me to health — ” 

The man of law seemed to have entirely forgotten all 
the confidences of his client, who now began to think of 
leaving so confirmed a valetudinarian to his own devices. 

“ Madame,” resumed the whilom solicitor of Mantes 
with a sudden access of seriousness, “ where a succession 
is in question there are two points to be considered ; 
first, whether the estate be worth the trouble one is 
about to take ; and secondly, who are the lawful heirs ; 
for, if the succession be the booty, the heirs represent 
the foe.” 

Thereupon Dame Cibot brought Remonencq and Elie 
Magus into play, and stated that those two cunning 
confederates valued the collection of pictures at six 
hundred thousand francs. 

'“Are they prepared to give that amount for it ?” asked 
the former solicitor of Mantes ; “ for, do you see, 
madame, we men of business don’t believe in pictures ; a 
picture, look you, is two francs worth of canvas or a 
hundred thousand francs worth of painting ! Now, the 
pictures which are worth a hundred thousand francs are 
well known ; and what grand mistakes have been made 
with regard to all, even the most celebrated, valuables 
of this kind ! Why, a well-known financier, whose gal- 
lery was bepraised, visited, even engraved, -engraved I 
mark you, was thought to have expended millions on 
his collection ; he dies (for die one must), well, h\s genu- 
ine pictures realized only two hundred thousand francs ! 


AN HOMME DE LOI.” t43 

You must bring these gentlemen to me. Now, what 
about the heirs ?” 

So saying, Fraisier resumed his attentive attitude. 
When he heard the name of President Camusot, he 
shook his head and made a grimace which riveted the 
attention of Dame Cibot ; she tried to read that brow, 
that atrocious physiognomy, and found it nothing but 
what we call in business a de bois. 

“Yes, my dear sir,” repeated Dame Cibot, ”my Mon- 
sieur Pons is own cousin to President Camusot de Mar- 
ville; he reminds me of the relationship twice a day. 
The first wife of Monsieur Camusot, the silk mercer — ” 

“ Who has just been made a peer of France — ” 

“Was a Demoiselle Pons, cousin-german to Monsieur 
Pons.” 

“They are first cousins once removed — ” 

“ They’re nothing whatever to each other now ; they’ve 
had a fall out.” 

Now, M. Camusot de Marville, before he came to 
Paris, had been for five years president of the tribunal 
at Mantes ; and had done more than leave behind him 
in that town the mere recollection of his name ; he had 
kept up a connection with the place in the person of the 
judge with whom, of all the judges of his court, he had 
been most intimate. The judge in question had suc- 
ceeded Camusot in the presidency of the court ; and 
was its president still. To him, therefore, Fraisier was 
thoroughly well known. 

“Are you aware, madame,” said Fraisier, when Dame 
Cibot had closed the ruddy flood-gates of her impetuous 
mouth, “are you aware that you would have for your 
principal antagonist a man who has it in his power to 
send people to the scaffold ?” 


244 


AN HOMME DE LOI. 


u 




At these words the portress started up from her chair 
as if she had been a Jack-in-the-box. 

“Calm yourself, my dear lady,” resumed Fraisier. 
“That you should not know what powers a president of 
the criminal division of the Parisian Court Royal-pos- 
sesses is perfectly natural, but you ought to have been 
aware that Monsieur Pons has a legal heir natural. 
Monsieur de Marville is the one sole heir of your 
patient ; but he is collateral heir in the third degree ; 
hence. Monsieur Pons may, without infringing the law, 
dispose of his fortune as he pleases. You are also igno- 
rant of the fact that the daughter of President Camusot 
was married at least six weeks ago to the eldest son of 
Count Popinot, peer of France, and ex-minister of agri- 
culture and commerce — one of the most influential 
statesmen of the day. This matrimonial alliance ren- 
ders the president still more formidable than he would 
be as sovereign of the Assize Court merely.” 

Again did Mme. Cibot quake when she heard this 
phrase. 

‘‘Yes, ’tis he who sends people to that place,” pursued 
Fraisier; “ah, my dear lady, you don’t. know what a 
red rope is ! It is bad enough, in all conscience, to 
have a plain black gown arrayed againt one ! If you 
behold me here ruined, bald, half dead ; why, ’tis 
becaus I unwittingly offended an insignificant provincial 
procurator-royal. I was compelled to sell my practice 
at a sacrifice, and was only too glad to escape with the 
loss of my fortune only. Had I taken it into my head 
to offer any resistance, I should have had my advocate’s 
gown stripped off my back. You have still something 
more to learn, and it is this : had we to deal with Presi- 
dent Camusot single-handed, that would be a mere trifle ; 
but, let me tell you, President Camusot has a wife j and. 


245 


“ AN HOMME DE LOI.” 

if you found yourself face to face with that wife, you 
would tremble as much as if your foot were on the first 
step of the scaffold ; the very hairs of your head would 
stand on end. So revengeful is Madame Camusot that 
she would spend ten years in entangling you in some 
snare which would be your ruin. She sets her husband 
to work just as a child will spin a top. In the course 
of her life she has caused a charming young man to 
commit suicide in the Conciergerie ; completely white- 
washed a count who was charged with forgery, and 
well-nigh brought about the interdiction of one of the 
greatest noblemen of the court of Charles X. Her latest 
exploit w'as to procure the dismissal of Monsieur Gran- 
ville, the attorney-general — ” 

“ The gentleman what lived in the Vieille Rue du 
Temple at the corner of the Rue Saint Frangois?” 
asked Dame Cibot. 

“The very same. They say she wants' to get her 
husband made Minister of Justice, and I don’t know 
that she won’t succeed. If she took it into her head to 
send the pair of us to the Assize Court, and thence to 
the galleys, I — / who am as innocent as the unborn 
babe — would get a passport and go to the United 
States ; so well do I know what justice is. Now, my 
dear Madame Cibot, the president’s wife, in order to 
secure for her only daughter the hand of young Vis- 
count Popinot (who, they say, is to be the heir of your 
landlord. Monsieur Pillerault), has so entirely stripped 
herself of her fortune that she and her husband are now 
obliged to live upon the bare salary of the president. 
And do you, my dear lady, imagine that, under these 
circumstances, Madame Camusot will allow the succes- 
sion of your Monsieur Pons to slip through her fingers ? 
Why, I would rather face a battery of guns charged 


246 


AN HOMME DE LOI.” 


with grape-shot than have such a woman for my adver- 
sary — ” 

“ But they’ve had a split,” interposed Dame Cibot. 

“What does that matter?” replied Fraisier. “ All the 
more reason why she should look after the money. To 
kill a relative against whom one has a grievance is — 
something ; but to come in for his fortune is — delight- 
ful !” 

“ But the good man hates his heirs. He keeps on 
telling me that these folks — I remember their names^ 
Monsieur Cardot, Monsieur Berthier, etc. — have crushed 
him as if he had been an egg under a dung-cart.” 

“ Have you a fancy to be crushed like that ?” 

“ My God ! my God !” exclaimed the portress. “ Ah ! 
well might Madame Fontaine say as I should meet 
with difficulties ; but still she told me as I should suc- 
ceed — ” 

“Listen to me, my dear Madame Cibot ; as to your 
getting a matter of thirty thousand francs, it is possible 
you may ; but as to the succession, you mustn’t even 
think of it. We talked your affair over — Doctor 
Poulain and I — yesterday evening — ” 

Here Madame Cibot made another bound upon her 
chair. 

“ Well, well ! what is the matter with you ?” 

“Why, if you knew all about my business, why did 
you let me jabber away like a magpie?” 

“ Madame Cibot, I knew all about your business, but 
I knew nothing about Madame Cibot ! So many clients, 
so many characters — 

On hearing these words Madame Cibot looked at her 
future adviser with a peculiar look — a look which 
divulged all her suspicions and by no means escaped 
the notice of Fraisier. 


fraisiee’s point. 


247 


CHAPTER XIX. 
fraisier’s point. 

“ To resume, then,” said Fraisier, “our friend Poulain 
was introduced by you to old Monsieur Pillerault, the 
great-uncle of Madame Popinot — that is one of your 
claims to my good offices. Now, mark what I say ; 
Poulain goes to see your landlord once a fortnight, and 
it is from him that the doctor learned all these details. 
The retired merchant was present at the wedding of his 
great-grandnephew (for he is an uncle who has a for- 
tune to leave, let me tell you ; he has a good fifteon 
thousand francs a year, and for the last five-and-twenty 
years has lived the life of a monk ; he spends barely 
three thousand francs per annum.) Well, he it was who 
told Poulain all about the marriage. It would seem 
that all this shindy was entirely caused by your worthy 
musician himself, from a feeling of spite against the 
president's family. He who listens to one bell only 
hears but one sound ; now, your invalid protests that he 
is innocent, but the world regards him as a monster.” 

“And a monster h^ may well be for n’aught I know ; 
it wouldn’t surprise me one bit,” exclaimed Dame Cibot. 
“ Only just fancy ; here have I been a-spending my own 
money on him any time these last ten years, as he well 
knows ; all my savings he has, and he won’t put me 
down for n’a penny in his will ; no, sir, that he won’t ; 
he’s that stubborn he’s a reg’lar mule. Here have I 
been a-talking to him on the subject for the last ten 
days, and the lubber won’t budge a single inch, no, not 


24:8 


feaisier’s point. 


no more than if he was a lottery term. He just keeps 
his teeth clinched, and looks at me just as if — Why, 
the most he’s said to me was as he would recommend 
me to Monsieur Schmucke.” 

“ Then it is his intention to make a will in favor of 
this Schmucke, is it?” 

“ He’ll give him everything—” 

“ Listen to me, my dear Madame Cibot ; I must, in 
order to form a definitive opinion and a plan, get to 
know Monsieur Schmucke, see the objects of which the 
estate consists, and have a conference with the Jew you 
speak of ; and then allow me to be your guide — ” 

“We will see about it, my good Monsieur Fraisier.” 

“ What do you mean by ‘ we will see about it ? ” cried 
Fraisier, darting a viper glance at Dame Cibot, and 
speaking in his natural tone of voice. “Come now ! am 
I or am I not your counsel ? Let us thoroughly under- 
stand one another.” 

Dame Cibot saw that she was found out, and felt a 
cold shiver run down her back. Seeing tjiat she was at 
the mercy of a tiger she said : “ You have my n’entire 
confidence.” 

“ We solicitors are accustomed to the treachery of our 
clients. Now examine your position well ; it is superb. 
If you follow my advice to the letter, you will have 
twenty or thirty thousand francs out of this estate, I 
warrant you. But there is another side to this beautiful 
medal. Suppose that Madame Camusot should learn 
that Monsieur Pons’ estate is worth a million francs, 
and that you want to get a slice of it — for there are 
always persons to be found who take upon them to say 
things of this kind — ” added Fraisier, parenthetically. 

This parenthesis, preceded and followed by a pause, 
made Dame Cibot shiver — she jumped to the conclusion 


fraisier’s point. 


210 


that Fraisier himself would undertake the office of 
informer. 

“In that case, my dear client, in ten minutes old 
Pillerault would be prevailed on to turn you out of the 
lodge, and you would have a couple of hours to pack up 
your traps.” 

“What odds would that be to me?” said Dame Cibot, 
startingto her feet and assuming a Bellonaattitude. “I 
should remain with the two gentlemen n’as their confi- 
dential housekeeper.” 

“Yes, and that being so, a trap would be laid for you, 
and you would wake up some fine morning to find your- 
self in a cell, you and your husband, charged with some 
capital crime — ” 

Me r cried Dame Cibot, as don’t owe nobody 
a single centime ; me ! itie ! — ” 

And she went on speaking for five minutes, while 
Fraisier watched the grand artist as she executed her 
concerto of self-laudation. He was cool and satirical ; 
his eye pierced Dame Cibot as if it had been a stiletto ; 
he laughed inwardly, and, as he laughed, his dry wig 
quivered. He was Robespierre, the Robespierre of 4.he 
days when that Gallic Sylla wrote quatrains. 

“And why, and wherefore, and on what pretext?” 
asked Dame Cibot, in conclusion. 

“Do you wish to know how you might come to be 
guillotined — ?” 

Pale as a corpse. Dame Cibot sunk back into her 
chair; for these words fell, as if they had been the blade 
of the law itself, upon her neck. She stared at Fraisier 
with bewildered eyes. 

“ Now, listen to me attentively, my dear child,” re- 
sumed Fraisier, suppressing all outward expression of 
the satisfaction that he derived from his client’s terror. 


250 


FRAISTER^S POINT. 


“ I would rather let the whole thing rest — ” mur- 
mured Madame Cibot, making an effort to rise, when 
Fraisier imperiously interposed. 

“Stop,” said he. “You ought to be informed of the 
risk you run ; it is my duty to give you the benefit of 
my knowledge. Well, then, let us take it that you are 
dismissed by Monsieur Pillerault ; there can be no doubt 
of that, can there? You enter the service of these two 
gentlemen ; good ! That in itself is a declaration of 
war between Madame Camusot and you. You on your 
part are determined to do your utmost to get hold of 
this succession, to make something out of it by hook or 
by crook — ” 

Here Dame Cibot made a gesture of dissent. 

“ Oh, I’m not blaming you ; that’s no part of my 
business,” said Fraisier, in answer to his client’s gesture. 
“But this enterprise is a combat, and you will be 
induced to go to greater lengths than you imagine. 
Under such circumstances, people get intoxicated with 
their own idea ; they hit hard — ” 

Here Madame Cibot indulged in another gesture of 
repudiation,' and drew herself up. 

“Come, come now, little mother,” pursued Fraisier, 
with horrible familiarity, “you would go great lengths 
now, you know you would — ” 

“ Oh ! then you take me for a thief, do you ?” 

“ Come now, mother, you have an I O U of Monsieur 
Schmucke’s that cost you very little. Ah ! ah ! you see, 
you’re at confession here, my pretty dame. Don’t deceive 
your confessor, especially when that confessor has the 
power of reading your very heart.” 

Dame Cibot was terrified at the perspicacity of this 
man ; she now clearly perceived the motive of the pro- 
found attention with which he had listened to her. 


FEAI8IER S POINT. 


251 


Well !” resumed Fraisier, you need not hesitate to 
admit that, in this race for a fortune, Madame Camusot 
will not suffer herself to be outstripped by you. You 
will be watched ; spies will be set upon your actions. 
You carry your point and are mentioned in Monsieur 
Pons’ will — granted. Nothing could be better. But 
one fine day in walks Madame Law and collars some 
barley water, at the bottom of which some arsenic is 
found ; you and your husband are arrested, tried — con- 
demned, for having attempted to murder Monsieur Pons, 
in order that you might pocket your legacy. I once 
defended a poor woman at Versailles, who was to the 
full as innocent as you would be in the case supposed ; 
matters stood exactly as I have just stated them ; and 
yet, all that I could do for her was just to save her from 
the scaffold ; the poor wretch was condemned to twenty 
years hard labor, and is now at Saint Lazare under- 
going her sentence !” 

The terror of Madame Cibot had now reached its 
climax. Pale and haggard, she kept her eyes fixed upon 
the lean little green-eyed lawyer, much as the poor 
Moorish woman, convicted of infidelity to her religion, 
must have gazed at the inquisitor when she heard herself 
sentenced to be burned alive. 

“ You say, then, dear Monsieur Fraisier, that by leav- 
ing of matters entirely in your hands, and n’intrusting 
the care of my n’interests to you, I should come in for 
something, without having anything to fear ?” 

“ I guarantee you thirty thousand francs,” said Fraisier, 
with the assured air of a man who perfectly well knows 
what he is talking about. 

“ And, after all,” resumed Dame Cibot, in her most 
wheedling tones, ‘‘you knows how fond I am of dear 
Dr. Poulain ; it was him as told me to come to you, and 


252 


FRAISIER S POINT. 


sure I am the worthy man didn’t send me here to be told 
as I’m going to be guillotined for poisoning people.” 

Here Mme. Cibot burst into a' flood of tears ; for this 
vision of the guillotine had made her very blood run 
cold ; her nerves were in a state of agitation ; her heart 
sunk within her ; she entirely lost her head. Fraisier, 
on the other hand, enjoyed his triumph. When he had 
seen his client hesitating, he felt that this piece of busi- 
ness was on the point of slipping through his fingers, 
and resolved to tame Mme. Cibot, to terrify her, to stun 
her, to bind her hand and foot, and have her entirely 
under his control. The portress, having stepped into 
that study (as a fly throws itself into'a spider’s web) was 
doomed to remain there, entrammeled and enmeshed, to 
feed the ambition of this little hoinme de loi. In fact, 
Fraisier was resolved to extract, from this piece of busi- 
ness, money enough to live upon in his old age, inde- 
pendence, enjoyment and social consideration. He and 
Poulain, on the previous evening, had maturely weighed 
and carefully — microscopically — examined the whole 
matter ; the doctor had informed his friend Fraisier what 
manner of man Schmucke was, and the active minds of 
Fraisier and Poulain had tested every hypothesis, and 
scanned each favorable feature of the enterprise, and 
each attendant risk. “The fortunes of both of us are 
involved in this business !” Fraisier had exclaimed, in 
a paroxysm of enthusiasm ; and he had promised Poulain 
the post of chief physician to some hospital, and himself 
the post of jiige de paix to the arrondissement. 

To become a juge de paix! was, to this man of great 
capacity, to this doctor of laws in want of socks, a 
chimera so difficult to mount, that he thought of it as 
the advocate who has fought his way into the chamber 
of deputies thinks of the robe of the chancellor, as the 


fraisiek’s point. 


253 


Italian priest thinks of the tiara. ’Twas a mania ! Mon- 
sieur Vitel,' the juge de paix in whose court Fraisier 
practised, was a valetudinarian of sixty-nine, and talked 
about retiring. Fraisier would chat to Poulain about 
succeeding Monsieur Vitel, much as Poulain would chat 
to Fraisier about the wealthy heiress whom Poulain was 
to rescue from the jaws of death, and marry. Few 
persons have even the remotest idea how keen is the 
competition for those places the occupation of which is 
compatible with residence in Paris. To live in Paris is 
a universal wish. Does a licensed tobacco-shop or a 
stamp-shop fall vacant? A hundred women rise, like 
one man, and set all their friends in motion, in order to 
obtain the berth ! Is there a probability of a vacancy 
in one of the four-and-twenty tax-collectorships of the 
metropolis ? There is a tumult of rival ambitions in the 
chamber of deputies ! These places are filled up by the 
council ; nominations to them are affairs of state ! Now 
the annual salary of a juge de paix at Paris is about six 
thousand francs. The registry attached to this tribunal 
is a post worth a hundred thousand francs. It is of all 
judicial offices one of the most eagerly coveted. Fraisier, 
once appointed a juge de paix^ and having the chief phy- 
sician of some hospital for a friend, would be certain to 
find a rich wife for himself, and a wife for Dr. Poulain 
also ; they would lend each other a helping hand in turn. 
Night had passed its leaden roller over all the thoughts 
of the former solicitor of Mantes ; a formidable scheme 
had germinated in his mind — a prolific scheme fertile in 
harvests and abounding in intrigues. Of this drama 
Dame Cibot was the mainspring ; so that it was abso- 
lutely necessary that the revolt of this instrument should 
be suppressed. That revolt was unexpected ; but, as 
we have seen, the quondam solicitor, by exerting all the 


254 


FRAJSIER^S POINT. 


powers of his maleficent nature, had brought the 
audacious portress to his feet. 

“ Come now, my dear Mme. Cibot, dismiss your fears,” 
said he, taking her hand in his. The touch of this hand, 
which was as cold as the skin of a snake, produced a 
terrible impression on the portress, and brought about 
a physical reaction which subdued her mental emotion. 
She thought that Ashtaroth, Mme. Fontaine’s toad, 
would be less dangerous to handle than this jar of 
poisons, capped with a reddish wig and speaking with 
the voice of a creaking door. 

“Don’t suppose that I am causing you unnecessary 
alarm,” resumed Fraisier, after noting this new gesture 
of repugnance on the part of Mme. Cibot. ‘ The affairs 
which have procured Mme. Camusot so terrible a repu- 
tation are so perfectly well known at the palace, that 
you can ask any one you please about them. The great 
nobleman, who was within an ace of being interdicted, 
is the Marquis d’Espard. ’Twas the Marquis d’Es- 
grignon whom she rescued from the galleys. The 
young man who — rich, handsome, full of promise, and 
on the eve of marriage with a young lady belonging to 
one of the first families in France — committed suicide 
by hanging himself in one of the cells of the Concier- 
gerie, was the celebrated Lucien de Rubempre, whose 
case caused a ferment throughout the whole of Paris at 
the time. There, too, it was a question as to a succes- 
sion — the succession of a kept mistress, the famous 
Esther, who left several millions behind her. This 
young man was accused of having poisoned her, for he 
was appointed heir under her will. Yet the young poet 
was not in Paris when the girl died ; he did not even 
know that he was her heir ! — it is impossible to be more 
innocent than that Well, after being subjected to an 


fraisier’s point. 


255 


interrogatory by M. Camusot, the young man hanged 
himself in his cell. The Law resembles Medicine ; it has 
its victims. In the former case one dies for Society ; in 
the latter, for Science,” said Fraisier, with a ghastly 
smile. “Well! you see that I know the danger. Law 
has already ruined me — me, a poor obscure little solicitor. 
My experience has cost me dear ; it is entirely at your 
service — ” 

“In faith, no thank you,” said Dame Cibot ; “I’ll 
give up everything. I shall have made an ungrateful 
man the more — I only wants my due ! I’ve a thirty 
years character for n’honesty, monsieur. My M. Pons 
says that he’ll recommend me in his will to his friend 
Schmucke; very well. I’ll end my days in peace, in the 
service of that worthy German — ” 

Fraisier was overshooting the mark ; he had discour- 
aged Dame Cibot, and found himself obliged to efface 
the terrible impression that had been made upon her. 

“Don’t let us despair of anything,” said he; “go 
quietly home ; it’s all right ; we will steer the matter 
into a safe port !” 

“But what am I to do, then, good M. Fraisier, in 
order that I may n’have an annuity and — ?” 

“ — No remorse,” said Fraisier, emphatically, taking the 
words out of Dame Cibot’s mouth. “ Why, it is pre- 
cisely for that purpose that professional men were 
invented. In these cases, there’s nothing to be gained 
unless you keep within the limits of the law. You don’t 
know the law ; /do. Under my guidance you will have 
legality on your side ; you will hold your own unmo- 
lested, so far as mankind are concerned ; for as to your 
conscience, that is your own lookout.” 

“ Well, say on,” replied Dame Cibot, whom this 
language had rendered not only inquisitive but cheerful. 


256 


fraisier’s point. 


“ I don’t know what to say ; I have not studied the 
possibilities of the case ; I have confined my attention 
to its difficulties. Your first care, look you, must be to 
get the will made, and in so doing you will not be on 
the wrong track ; but, before all, let us know in whose 
favor Pons will dispose of his fortune, for if it should 
turn out that you are his heiress — ” 

“No, no, he doesn’t love me! Ah I if I had only 
known the value of his baubles, and what he told me 
n’about his love affairs, I should be quite easy in my 
mind to-day — ’’ 

“Well,” said Fraisier, “pursue your course, all the 
same. Dying folks take strange fancies into their 
heads, my dear Madame Cibot ; they cheat many an 
expectation. Let him make his will, and we’ll see what 
is to be done afterward. But, first of all, we must get 
the objects composing the inheritance valued. So, do 
you introduce me to the Jew and this Remonencq ; they 
will be extremely serviceable to us. Repose every con- 
fidence in me, I am entirely yours. I am the friend of 
my client, ay, up to the very hilt, when that client is 
friendly to me. I am either friend or foe ; that’s my 
character.” 

“Very well, I shall place myself quite in your hands,” 
said Dame Cibot ; “ and as to your fees, M. Poulain 
will—” 

“Oh, don’t mention them,” said Fraisier. “Take care 
to keep Poulain in attendance on the patient ; the doc- 
tor is one of the most honest and one of the most 
upright men I know ; and, look you, we' are in need*.of 
a man there whom we can rely on. Poulain is a better 
man than I ; I have grown wicked.” 

“You look like it,” said Dame Cibot; “ but for my 
part, / would trust you — ” 






GAUDISSARD 


AT HIS DESK.— PafjC 262. 








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FRAISIER^S POINT 


257 


“And you would do rightly!” replied I^raisier ; 
“come and see me whenever anything turns up, and 
keep your course ; you are clever, and all will go well.” 

“Good-bye, Monsieur Fraisier; your servant.” 

Fraisier escorted his client to the door of his apart- 
ments. There, he did as the doctor had done on the 
preceding evening ; he clinched the matter in a parting 
word to the portress. 

“ If you could manage to get Monsieur Pons to ask 
for my advice, that would be a great step in advance.” 

“I’ll try,” replied Dame Cibot. 

“My jolly dame,” replied Fraisier, leading the por- 
tress back into his study, “ I am well acquainted with 
Monsieur Trognon, the notary ; he is the notary of the 
district ; if Monsieur Pons has no notary, mention M. 
Trognon ; insure his being selected.” 

“I take you,” replied Dame Cibot. 

As she withdrew, she overheard the rustling of a 
dress, and the sound of heavy footsteps, that would 
gladly have rendered themselves light. When she found 
herself alone in the street once more and had walked a 
certain distance, she regained her liberty of thought. 
Although she could not entirely shake off the influence 
of this conference, and although she still stood in great 
awe of the scaffold the law, and the judges, she came 
to a very natural determination — a determination the 
effect of which would be to place her in a position of 
tacit antagonism to her formidable adviser. 

“ What need is there for me to take any one into part- 
nership?” said she to herself. “Let me feather my own 
nest first ; and when I have done that I will accept 
whatever they offer me for playing their game.” 

This reflection was (as we shall see) destined to hasten 
t!ie end of the unfortunate musician. 


258 


“ UAME CIBOT AT THE THEATEE. 


CHAPTER XX. 

“dame CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

“Well ! my dear Monsieur Schmucke,” said the por- 
tress, as she entered the rooms of her two gentlemen ; 
“ and how is our dear darling of a patient getting on 

“Nod well,” replied the German; “ Bons’ mind has 
peen wandering all night long.” 

“ What has he been a-saying, then ?” 

“Mere nonzenze ! Dat he wizhed me to have all his 
fortune, on condition dat I would zell noding. And 
den he cried. Boor man ! it made me feel quide 
unhabby !” 

“ Oh, that will go off, my dear duckie !” replied, the 
portress. “ I’ve kept you a-waiting for your breakfast, 
seeing as how it’s past nine o’clock ; but you mustn’t 
scold me ; for I’ve had a heap of matters to attend to on 
your account, d’ye see. We were out of every blessed 
thing ; so I’ve been and got a little money !” 

“ How ?” inquired the pianist. 

“ What about my uncle ^ eh ?” 

“What ungle?” said Schmucke. 

“ Why, the scheme !” 

“ What zgheme ?” 

“ Lord bless the good man ! how simple he is, to be 
sure. No, really, ’pon my word, you’re a saint, a love, 
a n’archbishop of innocence, a man as is fit to be stuffed 
and put under a glass case, as the old actor says. 
What ! d’ye mean to tell me that you’ve been in Paris 
these nine-and-twenty years, and seen — let me see — 


“ DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 


259 


why, you must have seen the Revolution of July, and 
don’t know what the monde-piete is ? — the office where 
they lend you money on your rags ! I’ve taken all our 
silver spoons and forks there, eight of ’em, thread pat- 
tern. Bah ! Cibot can use Algerian metal at his meals ; 
it’s quite the fashion, as the saying is. And it’s not 
worth while a-saying anything about the business to our 
dear cherub ; it ’ud only worrit him and make him turn 
yellow ; and he’s quite fretful enough as it is. Let’s 
save him first, and see what’s to be done n’aftervvard. 
We must take things n’as they come — war times, war 
measures ; ain’t I right ?” 

“ Goot woman, nople heart !” exclaimed the poor 
musician, as he took Dame Cibot’s hand and pressed it 
to his heart, while the expression of his features showed 
that he was deeply touched. This angel of goodness 
raised his eyes to heaven ; they were full of tears. 

‘‘ Drop that, father Schmucke. You n’are quite 
absurd. That’s a pretty thing to make a fuss about, 
that is ! Why, I’m a n’old daughter of the people, I 
am, I carry my heart in my hand. I’ve plenty of that 
d’ye see,” exclaimed she, clapping her hand to her 
bosom; “just like you two gentlemen, which you’ve 
hearts of gold.” 

Fader Schmucke^'' echoed the musician ; “nay, after 
gauging de fery deps of zorrow ant weebing tears of 
bloot, to mount into de heavens, it is too moche for me ! 
I shall not surfife Bons — ” 

“ In faith, I verily believe you ; you’re a-killing of 
yourself. Now, listen to me, my duckie.” 

Duckie r repeated Schmucke. 

“ Well then, my dear little fellow !” 

“ Tear little vellow r 

“ My pippin then, if you like it better.” 


2f)0 “dame cibot at the theatre.” 

“ It is not de leazt bit blainer.” 

“ Never mind ; only let me take care of you and be 
your guide ; or else, if you go on as you’re going on 
now, I shall have two patients on my hands instead of 
one. In my poor opinion, we ought to do what is to be 
done here, turn and turn about. You can’t go on a-giv- 
ing lessons in town ; it wears you n’out, and makes you 
fit for nothing here, where we shall have to sit up all 
night, seeing as how Monsieur Pons is a-getting worse 
and worse. To-day I’ll step round to all your custom- 
ers, and tell ’em as you’re ill, eh ? Then you can spend 
the night at the bedside of our poor lamb, and you can 
get your rest in the morning, from five o’clock till, say 
two in the afternoon, /’ll do the most tiring part of the 
work — the day duty ; seeing as I must get your break- 
fast and dinner, look after the sick man, get him out of 
bed, change his linen, and give him his medicine. For 
really, I couldn’t holdout ten days longer as I’m a-going 
on now ; and we’ve been worrited to death for the last 
month over him. And what on earth would become of 
you if I was to fall ill ? And you, too, there, why it’s 
enough to frighten anybody to see how you look, along 
o’ sitting up with Monsieur Pons, just one night — ” 

So saying, she led Schmucke to the looking-glass, and 
Schmucke found that he was indeed much altered. 

“Well then, if you agrees to what I say. I’ll go and 
get your breakfast ready in a jiffy. Then you can con- 
tinue to look after our patient till two o’clock. But in 
the meantime, give me n’a list of your customers and I’ll 
very soon square matters, so as you’ll have a fortnight’s 
liberty. When I come back, you can go to bed and rest 
yourself till the evening.” 

This suggestion was so full of wisdom that Schmucke 
forthwith gave in his adhesion to it. 


DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE. 


261 


a 


“ Not a word to Monsieur Pons ; for you know as he'd 
give himself up for lost if we told him as how that he 
must knock off going to the theatre and giving lessons 
for a time. The poor man would take it into his head as 
he’d never get his pupils back again — and a pack o’ non- 
sense — and Monsieur Poulain says as we sha’n’t save our 
Benjamin unless we keeps him as quiet as a mouse.” 

“ Well, well, do you get de breakfast while I go ant 
brebare de list and giff you de addresses. You are quite 
right ; I zhould suggunfib.” 

An hour after this conversation took place, Mme. Cibot, 
tricked out in all her finery, set off in d^milord, much to 
Remonencq’s amazement. She reckoned that she would 
worthily impersonate the confidential housekeeper of 
the Pair of Nut-Crackers in all the boarding-schools and 
other establishments wherein the young lady pupils of 
the two musicians were to be found. It is unnecessary 
to reproduce the multifarious gossip to which Dame 
Cibot treated the school-mistresses and private families 
that she visited. Suffice it to say that it resembled the 
variations of a musical theme. We will confine our- 
selves to the rehearsal of the scene which occurred in the 
managerial sanctum of the Illustrious Gaudissard, into 
which the portress succeeded in penetrating, though not 
without encountering the most stupendous obstacles ; 
for, at Paris, managers of theatres are less easy of access 
than ministers and kings ; nor is it difficult to divine the 
reason why they raise such formidable barriers between 
themselves and the common herd of mortals ; whereas a 
king has to protect himself only against ambition, the 
theatrical manager has to shield himself from the aggres- 
sive vanity of the actor and the author ! 

The intimacy which wa’S very soon struck up between 
the door-keeper of the theatre and Dame Cibot enabled 


2G2 “dame ctrot at the theatre.” 

her, however, to clear every gulf. Porters, like all folks 
who have a common calling, understand one another 
perfectly. Every condition in life has its shibboleths 
even as it has its terms of obloquy and badges of 
disgrace. 

“ Ah ! madame,” quoth Dame Cibot, yoii are portress 
to the theatre ; I am only the humble portress of a house 
in the Rue de Normandie, in which your conductor. 
Monsieur Pons, lodges. Ah ! how happy I should be 
n’if I were in your shoes ; to see the actors and the 
ladies of the ballet and the n’authors a-passing in and 
out ! That is, as the old actor said, the field marshal’s 
baton of our calling.” 

“And how is worthy Monsieur Pons getting on?” 
inquired the portress. 

“Why, he isn't getting on at all ; it’s now two months 
since he was out of bed, and he’ll leave the house feet 
foremost, sure enough.” 

“ It will be a great loss — ” 

“Yes, he’s sent me here to explain his position to your 
manager ; try to let me get speech of him, my darling.” 

“A lady from Monsieur Pons to see you !” Thus did 
the page who attended the manager’s private room 
announce Mine. Cibot, who was recommended to him 
by the portress. Gaudissard had just arrived at the 
theatre to be present at a rehearsal. As chance would 
have it, no one wanted to speak with him, and not only 
the authors of the piece, but the actors and actresses, 
were late. He was delighted to have news of his con- 
ductor, and, with a Napoleonic gesture, indicated to the 
page that Dame Cibot was to be admitted. 

This quondam commercial traveler, now the head of 
a much-frequented theatre, was cheating his associates 
in the undertaking. He regarded them very much in 


“dame cibot at the theatre.” 263 

the light in which a man regards his lawful wife. The 
development of his financial talent had reacted on his 
person. Gaudissard, now grown stout and sturdy, and 
displaying on his cheeks the heightened color produced 
by good living and prosperity, had been palpably meta- 
morphosed into a Mondor. “ We are becoming a regular 
Beaujon !” he would say, endeavoring to forestall ridi- 
cule by being the first to laugh at himself — “Oh ! you 
are only Turcaret, as yet,” replied Bixiou, who often 
acted as Gaudissard’s deputy, in relation to the first lady 
of the ballet — the celebrated Heloise Brisetout. In 
short, the ex-lLLUSTRious Gaudissard worked the theatre 
exclusively, and without the slightest compunction, in 
his own interests. He had started by collaborating in 
the production of sundry ballets, vaudevilles and dra- 
matic pieces, and had bought up the interests of his 
coadjutors for a trifling sum, by taking advantage of 
those necessities which often hold the author in their 
relentless grip. Tacked on to dramas which drew, these 
pieces and vaudevilles brought a few gold coins into 
Gaudissard’s pocket every day ; then he contrived, by 
means of an agent, to make a profit on the sale of 
tickets, besides apprppriating as manager’s perquisites a 
certain number of tickets — enough to enable him to 
tithe the profits. These three species of managerial 
imposts, to say nothing of the sale of boxes and the 
presents that Gaudissard received from fourth-rate 
actresses ambitious of playing some insignificant part — 
that of a page or a queen for example — swelled his third 
share of the profits to such an extent that his co-partners 
(who were entitled to the other two thirds) took scarcely 
a tenth part of th^actual returns of the theatre. Still 
even this tenth represented a profit of fifteen per cent, 
on the capital invested. And accordingly, Gaudissard, 


264 : ‘^DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

backed by this dividend of fifteen per cent., prated about 
his intelligence, his probity, his zeal and the good for- 
tune of his partners. When Count Popinot, with a show 
of interest in the matter, asked M. Matifat, General 
Gouraud, son-in-law to Matifat, and Crevel, whether 
they were satisfied with Gaudissard, Gouraud, who had 
been made a peer of France, replied : 

“ They say that he robs us ; but he’s so witty, and so 
good a fellow that we are quite contented.” 

“Then it’s the fable of La Fontaine over again,” said 
the former minister with a smile. 

Gaudissard employed his capital in speculations quite 
unconnected with the theatre. He had formed a correct 
opinion of the Graffs, the Schwabs, and the Brunners, 
and took shares in the railway schemes projected by 
their firm. He cloaked his astuteness with the bluff 
and devil-may-care bearing of the libertine and voluptu- 
ary, and seemed to think only of enjoyment and the 
adornment of his person ; but, at the same time, nothing 
escaped him ; and he turned to good account the vast 
business experience which he had acquired as a bagman. 
This parvenu, who, even in his own eyes, was little 
better than a charlatan, lived in a luxurious suite of 
rooms, which had been arranged for him by the decora- 
tor of his theatre, and in which he gave suppers and 
other festive entertainments to the celebrities of the day. 
Fond of show and liking to do things handsomely, he 
affected to be an easy-going man, and seemed all the 
less formidable, in that he had retained — to use his own 
expression — the plating of his original vocation, while 
lining that plating with the slang of the greenroom. 
Now theatrical artists when at their theatres are in the 
habit of calling a spade a spade ; Gaudissard, accord- 
ingly, borrowed from the greenroom — which has a wit 


265 


‘^DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

of its own — enough good things to enable him, with the 
help of a rate in aid from the mordant pleasantry of the 
commercial room, to pass for a superior man. At the 
time of which we are writing he was thinking of selling 
his license, and — to employ his own ^hvsiSQ— passing on 
to other avocations. His ambition was to be managing 
director of some railway, to become a grave and rever- 
end member of society, to procure some government 
appointment, and marry Mile. Minard, the daughter of 
one of the wealthiest mayors in Paris. He hoped to be 
made a deputy for some place upon his line ^ and to make 
his way, by means of Popinot’s influence, to a seat at 
the Council of State. 

“ Whom have I the honor of addressing ?” inquired 
Gaudissard, arresting, with a managerial glance, the 
approach of Mme. Cibot. 

“ I am Monsieur Pons’ confidential housekeeper, mon- 
sieur,” replied Dame Cibot. 

“'Well, and how is the good old fellow getting on 

“ Badly, monsieur, very badly.” 

“ Oh, the devil ! the devil ! Pm sorry for that. I’ll 
go and see him ; for he’s one of those exceptional 
men — ” 

“ Oh ! yes, monsieur ; a regular angel, to be sure. I 
still sometimes ask myself how such a man could be in 
a theatre — ” 

“Why, madame, the theatre is a school of morality,” 
said Gaudissard. “ Poor Pons — (’Pon my word of honor 
a man 7nust have gone to seed ere he could take up with 
this creature) — He is a model man ; and, as for talent, 
why — When do you think he will be able to resume 
his duties ? for the theatre, unfortunately, resembles the 
diligences, which, full or empty, start at the appointed 
times. The curtain here rises at six o’clock every even- 


266 


^^DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

ing, and, let us be as sympathetic as we may, that won’t 
produce good music. Come, tell me how he is.” 

“ Alas ! my good sir,” said Dame Cibot, taking out her 
handkerchief and applying it to her eyes, “it is very 
shocking to have to say it, but I believe as we shall have 
the misfortune to lose him, although we nurse him like 
the n’apple of our eye — Monsieur Schmucke and me ; 
which indeed I am come to tell you as you must not 
count upon that good Monsieur Schmucke any longer, 
for he is going to sit up every night. One can’t help 
going on just as if there was some hope, and a-trying to 
save the dear good man from dying — but the doctor has 
given him up — ” 

“And what is he dying of?” 

“ Of grief, of the jaundice, of the liver complaint — ay, 
and all that mixed up with a heap of family matters.” 

“And of a doctor,” said Gaudissard ; “he ought to 
have called in Monsieur Lebrun, our own doctor ; that 
would have cost him nothing — ” 

“ Monsieur Pons has a doctor as is a regular God — 
but what can a doctor, however clever he may’n be, do 
against so many causes ?” 

“ I was greatly in need of the worthy Pair of Nut- 
Crackers for the music of my new fairy piece — ” 

“ Is it anything as I can do for them ?” asked Dame 
Cibot, with an air that would have done no dishonor to 
Jocrisse. 

Gaudissard burst into a roar of laughter. 

“ Monsieur, I am their confidential housekeeper, and 
there are a number of things as these gentlemen — ” 
Hearing Gaudissard’s noisy mirth, a woman who was 
outside exclaimed : “ Since you are laughing, one may 

come in, old man.” And with these words, the principal 
lady of the ballet bounced into the room and flung her- 


267 


‘‘dame cibot at the theatre.” 

self on to the only sofa it contained. This first lady 
was Heloise Brisetout, who was wrapped in one of those 
magnificent scarfs which are called Algeriens. 

“ What is it makes you laugh ? Is it this lady ? What 
sort of an engagement is she on the lookout for ?” said 
the danseuscy surveying Mme. “Cibot with one of those 
glances with which one artiste is wont to scan another, 
and which ought to be transferred to canvas. 

Heloise, a young woman who had a great turn for 
literature, was well known in Bohemia, and was on 
intimate terms with several great artists, and was 
endowed with elegance, subtilty and grace — possessed 
more wit than is usually allotted to principal ladies of 
the ballet. As she put her question she applied a 
vinaigrette to her nose. 

“Let me tell you, madame, as all women are equal, 
when they n’are handsome ; and if I don't sniff the plague 
out of a smelling-bottle, and if I don't put powdered 
brick-dust on my cheeks — ” 

“ Considering what nature has already done for you 
in that direction, that would be an audacious pleonasm, 
my child !” said Heloise, smirking at the manager. 

“ I am an honest woman — ” 

“ So much the worse for you,” said Heloise. “’Tisn’t 
every one who can get hold of a protector, by jingo ; 
but I have one, madame, and a famous one he is, too !” 

“What do you mean by your ‘so much the worse ?’ 
It’s all very fine for you to wear Algeriens on your 
shoulders and to rig yourself out. But for all that, 
you’ll never receive so many declarations of love as I’ve 
had in my time, medeme ! And you’ll never be a match 
for the pretty oyster-girl at the Cadran-Bleu.” 

Here the danseuse rose suddenly from her seat, threw 
herself into the attitude of a solider porting arms, and 


268 


“dame ctbot at the theatre.’^ 

carried the back of her right hand to her forehead, as a 
private soldier does when he salutes his general. 

“ What !” exclaimed Gaudissard ; “ you the pretty 
oyster-girl that my father used to talk to me about?” 

“ If so, madame knows neither the cachucha nor the 
polka, then ? Madame must be over fifty !” said Heloise, 
assuming a dramatic pose, and declaiming the line : 

“ Cinna, let us be friends !” 

“Come, Heloise, madame is not in trim, leave her 
alone.” 

“ Is this lady the Nouvelle Heloise ?” asked the por- 
tress with an air of assumed simplicity that was replete 
with sarcasm. 

“ Not bad for the old one !” cried Gaudissard. 

“ It’s as old as the hills,” retorted the danseuse. “ That 
joke has gray mustaches ; find us another, old girl, or — 
take a cigarette.” 

“ Excuse me, madame,” said Dame Cibot ; “ I am too 
downhearted to keep the game alive ; my two gentle- 
men are very ill, and in order to provide them with food 
and spare them worry. I’ve pawned even my husband’s 
clothes this morning; see, here’s the ticket — ” 

“ Oh, now the affair is taking a dramatic turn,” cried 
the fair Heloise. “What is it all about ?” 

“ Madame breaks in upon us like — ” 

“ Like a first lady of the ballet,” said Heloise. “ You 
see I am prompting you, medeme.” 

“ Come, come, I am pressed for time,” cried Gaud- 
issard. “ We have had enough nonsense of that sort. 
This lady, Heloise, is the confidential housekeeper of 
our poor conductor, who is dying. She is come to tell 


269 


DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

me that I musn’t count upon his reappearing here ; I 
am in a difficulty — ” 

“ Oh ! poor fellow ! we must give him a benefit.” 

“ That would be his ruin !” said Gaudissard. “ Next 
morning he might find himself twenty pounds in debt 
to the infirmaries, which won’t recognize the existence 
in Paris of any other sufferers than those they themselves 
relieve. No, look here, my good woman, since you are 
going to compete for the Montyon prize — ” 

Here Guadissard interrupted himself to ring the bell, 
and said to the page who forthwith answered the sum- 
mons : 

“ Tell the treasurer to send me a forty-pound note. 
Take a seat, madame,” he added, turning to Madame 
Cibot. 

“ Ah ! see, the poor woman is crying. That’s foolish,” 
exclaimed the danseuse. “ Come now, mother, cheer up, 
we’ll go and see him. I say, you Chinee,” said she to 
the manager, as she drew him aside into a corner of the 
room, “ you mean to give me the chief part in the ballet 
of ‘Ariadne,’ don’t you ? You are going to get married, 
and you know how I can plague you !” 

“ Heloise, my heart is like a frigate ; it is sheathed 
with copper.”' 

“ I will show the children I have had by you ! I will 
borrow some on purpose !” 

“ I have made a clean br<?ast of our attachment — ” 

“ Be a good fellow and give Pons’ berth to Garangeot ; 
the poor lad has talent, and he is penniless. I promise 
you peace if you will.” 

But wait till Pons is dead ; the old fellow may 
recover yet.” 

“ Oh ! as for that, monsieur, certainly not,” said 
Dame Cibot. “ Since last night, when his mind began 


270 


“ DAME Cl HOT AT THE THEATRE. 


to wander, he’s been delirious. Unfortunately, it will 
soon be all over.” 

“ At all events, let Garangeot fill the post in the 
interim,” said Heloise. “ He has the whole of the press 
at his back.” 

At this moment in came the treasurer with two 
twenty-pound notes in his hand. 

“ Give them to madame,” said Gaudissard. “ Fare- 
well, my good woman, take good care of the dear fel- 
low, and tell him that I will come to see him to-morrow 
or the day after — as soon as ever I can.” 

“ A man overboard,” cried Heloise. 

“ Ah ! monsieur, hearts like yours are only to be 
found at theatres. May God bless you !” 

“ To what account am I to carry this ?” inquired the 
treasurer. 

“ I will give you a written voucher ; carry it to the 
gratuity account.” 

Before she left the room. Dame Cibot bowed cere- 
moniously to the danseuse^ and overhead Gaudissard 
address the following question to his former mistress : 

“ Is Garangeot strong enough, think you, to knock 
off the music of our ballet, ‘ The Mohican,’ for me in 
twelve days ? If he gets me out of the fix, he shall be 
Pons’ successor !” 

Thus did the portress (who received a larger recom- 
pense for having wrought so much mischief than she 
would have derived from the doing of a good action) 
suppress, at one fell swoop, all the resources of the two 
friends, and deprive .them of their livelihood in case of 
Pons’ restoration toThealth. This treacherous manoeuvre 
was certain to bring about, within a few days, the 
result which Dame Cibot desired — namely, the sale of 
the pictures coveted by Elie Magus. In order to realize 


“dame CiBOT AT THE THEATRE.’’ 271 

this preliminary spoliation, it was needful for the portress 
to lull the formidable ally whom she had called in — the 
advocate Fraisier, and to insure the absolute silence of 
Elie Magus and Remonencq. As to the latter, he had 
gradually succumbed to one of those all-absorbing 
passions to which the uneducated are liable, when, com- 
ing to Paris from the depths of their provinces, they 
bring with them the fixed ideas engendered by the 
seclusion of country life, the sordid ignorance of primitive 
natures, and the crude desires that isolation has con- 
verted into domineering tyrants. The masculine beauty 
of Mme. Cibot, her vivacity and Billingsgate wit, had 
attracted the attention of the broker, and inspired him 
with a desire to take her away from Cibot, and make 
her his concubine — a species of bigamy much more 
common among the lower orders of Paris than is gen- 
erally supposed. But avarice, acting like a slip-knot, 
gained day by day a firmer hold upon the heart, and 
ended by disturbing the head of Remonencq. Thus, by 
calculating the commission that was to be paid to Dame 
Cibot by Elie Magus and himself at forty thousand 
francs, he became imbued with the desire of making her 
his lawful spouse, and so o’erleaped the boundary that 
separates the simple delict from crime. In the course 
of the long pipe-inspired reveries in which he indulged, 
seated on his doorstep, he was led, by this purely 
commercial passion, to long for the death of the little 
tailor. If the little tailor died, Remonencq saw, in per- 
spective, his capital well-nigh tripled ; and then the 
thought occurred to him, how excellent a tradeswoman 
Dame Cibot would make, and what a fine figure she 
would cut in a magnificent shop upon the boulevard. 
This twofold covetousness intoxicated Remonencq. He 
hired an imaginary shop upon the Boulevard de la 


272 


“ DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATEE.” 

Madeleine, and filled it with the choicest objects in the 
collection of the deceased Pons. After having slumbered 
in golden sheets, and seen millions in the blue spirals of 
his pipe, he awoke to find himself face to face with the 
little tailor, who was sweeping the court, the gate-way 
and the pavement in front of the house, while the 
Auvergnat was taking down the shutters of his shop, 
and arranging the goods in his window ; for since Pons 
had been laid up, Cibot acted as his wife’s substitute in 
the performance of those functions which she had taken 
upon herself. This olive-hued, copper-colored, stumpy 
little tailor, then, the Auvergnat considered as the only 
impediment to happiness, and he put to himself the 
question, “ How am I to get rid of him This grow- 
ing passion rendered Dame Cibot extremely proud of 
herself — for she was verging upon that time of life when 
women begin to understand that it is possible for them 
to grow old. 

One fine morning, then, as soon as Dame Cibot was 
up, she fixed a gaze of pensive scrutiny on Remonencq 
as he was engaged in arranging the knickknacks in his 
shop-front. She was curious to learn how far his passion 
for her would carry him. 

“Well !’’ said the Auvergnat, making up to her ; “are 
things going on as you would have them ?” 

“ It’s you as makes me uneasy,” replied Dame Cibot, 
“ you are getting me into a scrape,” she added ; “ the 
neighbors will come to notice the sheep’s eyes as you 
make at me.” 

Thereupon she quitted the gate-way, and plunged into 
the innermost recesses of Remonencq’s shop. 

“ What an idea !” said the Auvergnat. 

“ Come here ; I want to speak to you,” said Dame 
Cibot. “ Monsieur Pons’ heirs are astir, and they may 


DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 273 

cause US a good deal of bother. God only knows what 
would happen if they was to send a lot of professional 
men to poke their noses into everything like so many 
hounds. I can't persuade Monsieur Schmucke to sell a 
few of the pictures n’unless you love me well enough to 
keep it dark — oh, so dark that you wouldn’t split even 
if your head was on the block — both as to where the 
pictures come from and who it was as sold ’em to you. 
You know that when once Monsieur Pons is dead and 
buried, if they find fifty-three pictures instead of sixty- 
seven, no one’ll know how many there were ! Besides, 
if Monsieur Pons sold ’em during his life-time no one 
could say a word about it.” 

“Yes, it’s all the same to replied Remonencq ; 
“ but Monsieur Elie Magus will require receipts in 
regular form.” 

“ Oh, you shall have your receipt, too, begging your 
parding ! Do you suppose as it will be me that’ll write 
it out for you 1 It will be Monsieur Schmucke. But 
you must tell your Jew to be as mum as you are your- 
self.” 

“We will be as mute as fishes. It’s quite in the way 
of our trade. Now, for my part, I can read, but I can’t 
write, and that’s -why I want a well-taught and clever 
woman like you for my wife ! /, who have never 

thought of anything beyond getting enough to keep me 
in my old age, should like to have some little Remon- 
encqs now. Give your Cibot the slip — ” 

“ Why, here comes your Jew,” said the portress ; “ now 
we can arrange matters.” 

“Well, my dear lady,” said Elie Magus, who had been 
coming every third day to know when he could buy the 
pictures, “how do we stand now ?” 

“ Haven’t you seen any one who has spoken to you 


274 ‘^DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATRE.” 

about Monsieur Pons and his gewgaws ?” asked Dame 
Cibot. 

“ I have had a letter from an advocate,” replied Elie 
Magus ; “ but, as he seemed to me to be a sharp practi- 
tioner, who goes in for pettifogging, and I distrust such 
fellows, I did not answer his letter. At the end of three 
days he came to see me, and left a card ; I told my por- 
ter that I should never be ‘at home’ when that man 
called.” 

“ Oh, you darling Jew !” said Dame Cibot, who was 
but imperfectly acquainted with the prudence of Elie 
Magus. “ Well, my little men, in a few days time I’ll 
cajole Monsieur Schmucke into selling you seven or 
eight pictures — ten at the outside — but on two con- 
ditions ; and the first is absolute silence ! It’ll be Mon- 
sieur Schmucke what sent for you, eh, monsieur ? It’ll 
be Monsieur Remonencq as suggested to Monsieur 
Schmucke that you should be the buyer ? In short, what- 
ever happens, I shall have had naught to do with the 
matter. You’ll give forty-six thousand francs for the 
four pictures, eh ?” 

“ So be it,” sighed the Jew. 

“Very good,” said the portress. “The second con- 
dition is that you hand over forty-three thousand francs 
to me, and that you buy the pictures of Monsieur 
Schmucke for three thousand francs only. Remonencq 
here’ll buy four for two thousand francs, and will hand 
me over the balance. But besides that, look you, dear 
Monsieur Magus, I’ve been the means of you n’and 
Remonencq-doing a good stroke of business on condition 
that we all three go shares in the profits. I’ll n’intro- 
duce this advocate to you ; or he will, no doubt, come 
here if he’s asked. You’ll value all Monsieur Pons’ 
belongings at the prices as you can afford to give for ’em, 


“dame cibot at the theatre.” 


275 


in order that this Monsieur Fraisier may be sure of the 
value of the property. Only, mind you, he mustn’t, on 
no account, come here before our sale takes place.” 

“ That’s understood,” said the Jew ; “ but it will take 
some time to examine the things, and put a price upon 
them.” 

“You will have half a day for that. Come, that’s my 
look-out. Talk -the matter over and settle it between 
you, my lads ; then the day after to morrow the thing 
may be done. I’m a-going to see this here Fraisier and 
have a chat with him ; for he learns all that goes on here 
through his friend. Doctor Poulain, and it’s no light task 
to keep the beggar quiet.” 

When Dame Cibot was midway between the Rue de 
Normandie and the Rue de la Perle she met Fraisier, 
who was making for her abode ; so impatient was he to 
gather — to use his own phrase — the elements of the 
affair. 

“ Why ! I was on my way to your place,” said Dame 
Cibot. 

Fraisier complained about not having been received 
by Elie Magus ; but the spark of distrust, which was 
beginning to gleam in the eyes of the man of law, 
was extinguished by the portress telling him that-Magus 
had only just returned from a journey, and that on the 
day after to-morrow, at latest, she would bring him and 
Fraisier together in Pons’ rooms, so that the value of 
the collection might be ascertained. 

“Deal with me frankly,” said Fraisier; “it is more 
than probable that the interests of Monsieur Pons’ heirs 
will be confided to my care. In that position I shall be 
far better able to be of use to you.” 

These words were uttered in so dry a tone that Dame 
Cibot trembled. It was obvious that thishuhgry limb 


276 ‘‘DAME CIBOT AT THE THEATEE.” 

of law would manoeuvre, on his part, just as she was 
manoeuvreing on hers ; so she resolved to hasten the sale 
of the pictures. Dame Cibot was right in her conjec- 
tures. The advocate and the doctor had gone to the 
expense of an entirely new suit for Fraisier, in order that 
he might present himself in suitable attire before 
Madame Camusot de Marville. The time required for 
the making of the clothes was the only cause which 
retarded this interview — an interview that would decide 
the fate of the two friends. It was Fraisier’s intention, 
after his visit to Madame Cibot’s, to go to the tailor’s 
and try on his coat, waistcoat and trousers. He found 
those garments finished and awaiting him ; went home, 
donned a new wig, and, at about ten o’clock in the morn- 
ing, started, in a hired cabriolet, for the Rue de Hanovre, 
where he hoped to obtain an audience from Madame 
Camusot. Fraisier in a white cravat, yellow gloves and 
a new wig, Fraisier scented with Portugal water, resem- 
bled those poisons which are placed in cut-glass vials and 
covered with white kid ; they are daintily labeled ; the 
very string that binds the stopper is natty ; but for these 
very reasons they appear all the more dangerous. Frai- 
sier’s trenchant aspect, his pimplyface, his cutaneous affec- 
tion, green eyes, and the odor of evil that hung about 
him, were as conspicuous as clouds against an azure sky. 
When he was in his study, as he had appeared to Dame 
Cibot, he was the common knife used by the assassin 
to perpetrate his crime ; but at the door of Mme. 
Camusot he resembled the elegant dagger that a young 
lady carries in her little dunkerque. 


277 


“ FKAISIEK IN BLOSSOM.” 


CHAPTER XXI. 

“ FRAISIER IN BLOSSOM.” 

A great change had occurred in the Rue de Hanovre. 
Viscount and Viscountess Popinot — the ex-minister 
and his wife — had been unwilling that the president and 
Mme. Camusot should quit the house which they had 
settled on their daughter, and go into lodgings. The 
president and his wife, therefore, installed themselves 
upon the second floor, which was left vacant by the 
departure of the old lady — its former tenant — who 
wished to pass the closing years of her existence in the 
country. Thus, Mme. Camusot — who retained in her 
service Madeleine Vinet, the man-servant and the cook, 
had gone back to the penury from which she had started 
< — a penury that was alleviated by the fact that she 
inhabited, rent free, a suite of rooms that would have 
cost four thousand francs a year, and by her husband’s 
salary of ten thousand francs. This aurea mediocritas was, 
in itself, by no means satisfactory to Mme. de Marville, 
who would have had her fortune in keeping with her 
ambition ; but this was not her only grievance ; the 
cession of all the family property to Cecile involved the 
loss of the president’s eligibility to the chamber of 
deputies. Now, Amelie wanted her husband to be a 
deputy — for she did not readily abandon her projects — 
nor did she even yet despair of securing the president’s 
election for the arrondissement in which Marville is 
situated. Accordingly, for the last two months she had 


278 “ FRAISIER IN liLOSSOM.” 

been importuning M. le Baron Camusot — for the new 
peer of France had obtained the title of little baron — to 
advance the sum of a hundred thousand francs ©ut of 
her husband’s expectant patrimony in order, as she said, 
that he might buy a small estate inclosed by the estate of 
Marville, and producingaclear rental of about two thous- 
and francs. She and her husband would then have a 
home of their own in close proximity to the residence of 
their children, while the estate of Marville would to 
that extent be rounded and increased. Mme. Camusot 
made capital with her father-in-law out of the state of 
denudation to which she had been reduced by her 
endeavors to secure the hand of Viscount Popinot for 
her daughter. She asked the old man whether he could 
bear to see the path that led to the supreme honors of 
the magistracy, honors which would in future be 
reserved for those who had a strong parliamentary posi- 
tion, to remain closed to his eldest son ; and pointed out 
to him that the concession she implored would enable 
her husband to take up such a position, and so make* 
himself formidable to the ministry. “These people,” 
she said, “give nothing except to those who twist their 
neck-ties for them until their tongues hang out. They 
are an ungrateful set. What do they not owe to 
Camusot, by forcing on the issue of the ordonnances of 
July, brought about the elevation of the House of 
Orleans — ” 

In reply to all this, the old man pleaded that he was 
involved in railway speculations beyond his means, and 
postponed this act of liberality — the necessity of which 
he admitted — until an anticipated rise in the value of 
his railway shares should have occurred. This quasi- 
promise, which the president’s wife had extorted a few 
days previously to Fraisier’s visit, had filled her with 


279 


“ FRXTSIER IN blossom/’ 

despair. It was doubtful whether the ex-proprietor of 
Marville would be in time for the re-election of the 
chamber ; for it was necessary that he should have been 
in possession of his qualification for a year, at least, 
before presenting himself to the electors. 

Fraisier had no difficulty in obtaining access to Made- 
leine Vinet. These two viperine natures recognized^ 
each other as having been hatched from the same egg. 

“ Mademoiselle,” said Fraisier, in honeyed accents, “ I 
should like to have a moment’s audience with Madame 
la Presidente in regard to a matter in which she is per- 
sonally interested, and which affects her fortune. Be 
sure you tell her that it is a question of a succession. I 
have not the honor of being known to Madame la Presi- 
dente, so that the mention of my name would carry no 
weight with it. It is not my custom to leave my office, 
but I know the attentions that are due to the wife of a 
president, and have, therefore, taken the trouble to come 
here in person ; and that the more because the affair 
does not admit of the slightest delay.” 

Put in this form, and repeated and amplified by the 
lady’s-maid, the application naturall}^ elicited a favorable 
reply. Now, this was a critical moment for Fraisier’s 
twofold ambition, and, accordingly, in spite of his intre- 
pidity as a little provincial solicitor full of self-assertion, 
asperity and keenness, his sensations resembled those 
of the commander of an army when engaging in a battle 
that may decide a campaign. As Fraisier passed into 
the little drawing-room in which Amelie was waiting 
for him, he experienced what no sudorific, however 
potent, had hitherto been able to produce upon his 
refractory skin, whose pores were clogged by hideous 
maladies — he felt a slight perspiration upon his back 
and on his forehead, and mentally ejaculated ; 


280 FEAISIER IN BLOSSOM.” 

“ If my fortune be not made, my body is saved, for 
Poulain assured me that my health would be re-estab- 
lished whenever the action of the skin should be 
restored. Madame,” he began, so soon as he caught 
sight of Mme. Camusot, who presented herself at the 
audience in demi-toilet, then pausing, he bowed to the 
lady with all the deference whereby ministerial officers 
acknowledge the superior standing of those whom they 
accost. 

“Be seated, monsieur,” said Mme. Camusot, who saw 
at a glance that Fraisier belonged to the legal world. 

“ Madame la Presidente, if I have taken the liberty of 
addressing myself to you in a matter of importance 
which concerns Monsieur le President, it is because I 
am thoroughly convinced that, occupying the high posi- 
tion which he does. Monsieur de Marville would very 
likely leave things to take their natural course, and thus 
incur a loss of from seven to eight hundred thousand 
francs, a sum which ladies, who, in my humble opinion, 
understand private affairs far better than magistrates 
do, will not despise — ” 

“You said something about a succession — ” inter- 
rupted Mme. Camusot. 

Amelie, who was dazzled by the magnitude of the 
sum, and wanted to conceal her astonishment and 
delight, followed the example of those impatient readers 
who skip to the conclusion of a romance. 

“ Yes, madame, a succession that was lost to you — ay, 
utterly, irretrievably lost — but which I am able, or shall 
be able, to restore to you.” 

“ Proceed, monsieur,” said Mme. de Marville, coldly, 
examining Fraisier from head to foot and scrutinizing 
him with a sagacious eye. 

“ I know your eminent abilities, madame ; I come 


281 


“ FRAISIER IN BLOSSOM.” 

from Mantes. Monsieur Leboeuf, the president of the 
tribunal there — the friend of Monsieur de Marville — can 
give him some information as to who and what I am — ” 

At these words, Mme. Camusot drew herself up in a 
manner so cruelly significant that Fraisier was com- 
pelled to insert a hurried parenthesis in his discourse. 

“ — A lady so distinguished as yourself, madame, will 
at once understand why I begin by talking about 
myself. That is the shortest way of coming to the suc- 
cession.” 

To this subtle remark Mme. Camusot replied only by 
a gesture. Encouraged by this gesture to tell his story, 
Fraisier resumed : 

“ I was formerly a solicitor at Mantes, madame. My 
practice was, naturally, all that I had to depend upon, 
for I bought the practice of Monsieur Levroux, with 
whom you were doubtless acquainted — ” 

Mme. Camusot bowed. 

“ — With the money which I borrowed, and ten thous- 
and francs of my own, I quitted Desroches — one of the 
ablest solicitors in Paris — whose chief clerk I had been 
for six years. I had the misfortune to incur the dis- 
pleasure of the procurator-royal of Mantes, Monsieur — ” 

“ Olivier Vinet — ” 

“ — Son of the procurator-general ; yes, madame. He 
was paying his addresses to a little lady — ” 

Her 

“ — Madame Vatinelle — ” 

“Ah, Madame Vatinelle — she was very pretty and 
very — in my time — ” 

“ — She had a penchant for your humble servant, bide 
irce^" pursued Fraisier. “I was energetic, I wanted to 
reimburse my friends and to get married ; I wanted busi- 
ness ; I hunted it up ; and I very soon managed to brew 


282 FKAISIEK IN BLOSSOM.” 

more business for myself than all the other ministerial 
officers at Mantes put together. Bah ! the result was 
that all the solicitors and notaries — ay, and even the 
bailiffs — of Mantes, entered into a league against me. 
You are well aware, madame, that in our execrable call- 
ing, when a man’s ruin is desired, ’tis easily accom- 
plished. I was caught acting for both parties in a cer- 
tain case. It is just a trifle irregular, I admit ; but at 
Paris the thing is done in certain cases ; for here 
solicitors play into each other’s hands. They don’t at 
Mantes. Monsieur Bouyonnet — to whom I had already 
done that little favor — was imped by his cotifreres and 
spurred on by the procurator-royal to betray me — you 
see that I don’t attempt to hide anything from you. In 
fact, it was a general folk ; I was a rogue ; I was painted 
blacker than Marat. I was compelled to sell my 
practice, and I lost my all. I am now in Paris, where I 
have tried to get together a business connection ; but 
my health is so bad that I can scarcely reckon on two 
hours ease out of the twenty-four. I have but one 
ambition now, and it is of the humblest character. You, 
madame, will perhaps some day be the wife of the 
keeper of the seals, or of a chief president ; as for me, 
poor sorry creature that I am, my only desire is to have 
some post in which I can tranquilly pass the days that 
yet remain to me — some cul-de-sac^ some quiet berth in 
which one vegetates. I should like to be a juge de paix 
at Paris. ’Tis a very simple matter for you and 
Monsieur le President to obtain my nomination to that 
post ; for you must cause the keeper of the seals enough 
annoyance to render him willing to oblige you. That 
is not all, madame,” added Fraisier, with a gesture, see- 
ing that Mme. Camusot was on the point of speaking. 
“ The doctor who attends the old man, whose fortune 


283 


“ FRAISIER IN BLOSSOM.’’^ 

Monsieur le President should inherit, is a friend of mine 
— you perceive that we are coming to the point — Well, 
this doctor, whose co-operation is indispensable to us, is 
in a position strictly analogous to mine — plenty of talent, 
no opportunities ! ’Tis through him that I came to 
know how deeply your interests are suffering ; for even 
while I address you, it is probable that all is at an end — 
that the will which disinherits Monsieur le President is 
made. Now, this doctor wants to be appointed chief 
physician to some hospital or to some public schools ; 
in short, you will understand, he longs for a position in 
Paris precisely and analogous to that which I covet. I 
trust that you will pardon me for having touched upon 
these two delicate topics ; but in this business there 
must not be any — even the slightest — ambiguity. This 
doctor, moreover, is a person who is held in high 
esteem, a skilful man — a man who saved the life of 
Monsieur Pillerault, the great-uncle of your son-in-law. 
Monsieur le Vicomte Popinot. Now, if you are so good 
at to promise me these two places — that of jiige de paix 
for myself, and the medical sinecure for my friend — I 
undertake to secure you this succession almost intact — 
I say almost intact, because it will be subject to the 
charges which must be created in favor of the legatee 
and sundry other persons whose concurrence is abso- 
lutely necessary. You will not be called upon to fulfill 
your promises until 1 shall have fulfilled 7nine." 

Here Mme. Camusot, who had just folded her arms, 
after the fashion of a person who is forced to listen 
to a lecture, unfolded them, looked at Fraisier, and 
observed : 

“ Monsieur, you display a meritorious perspicuity in 
all that relates to yourself ; but as regards me and my 
affairs I must say, your obscurity is quite — ” 


284 “ FRAISIER m BLOSSOM.’’ 

“Madame/’ replied Fraisier, “ two words will suffice to 
explain everything. Monsieur le President is the sole 
and single heir, in the third degree, of Monsieur Pons. 
That gentleman is very ill and is on the point of making 
his will — if indeed he has not already made it — in favor 
of his friend, a German named Schmucke. The value of 
the succession exceeds seven hundred thousand francs. 
Within three days I hope to have the most accurate 
information as to the amount of — ’’ 

“ If this be so,” remarked Mme. Camusot in an aside — 
she was quite astounded at the possibility of the value 
of the estate being so large — “ if this be so, I committed 
a grand mistake in quarreling with him and crushing 
him.” 

“Not so, madame ; for but for that rupture he would 
now be as merry as a lark, and would outlive you, Mon- 
sieur le President, and myself into the bargain. Provi- 
dence,” added he, by way of disguising the hideous idea 
to which he had just given vent — “ Providence has its 
own mysterious ways ; let us not attempt to fathom 
them ! As for us professional men, we are prone to take 
a plain, matter-of-fact view of things. Now, madame, 
you will see that Monsieur de Marville, holding the 
high judicial position he does, would not stir, could not stir 
in this matter, things being as they are. He is at daggers 
drawn with his cousin ; you have shut your door in 
Pons’ face ; you have banished him from society. You 
had, no doubt, most excellent reasons for acting as you 
did ; but the old man falls ill, he bequeaths his goods 
and chattels to his only friend. A president of one of 
the Courts Royal of Paris cannot raise any objection to 
a duly executed will made under such circumstances. 
Yet, between you and me, madame, when one has an 
equitable right to a succession of seven or eight hundred 


285 


“ FRAISIER IN BLOSSOM.’’ 

thousand francs — it may be a million for aught I know — 
and one is the sole heir designated by law, it is disagree- 
able in the extreme to be done out of one’s own. But, 
then, in order to avert this catastrophe, one gets mixed 
up in all sorts of unworthy intrigues — intrigues that are 
extremely knotty and full of difficulties ; while at the 
same time it is so absolutely necessary to have dealings 
with the dregs of society, servants, underlings, and so 
forth, and to come into such close contact with them, 
that no Parisian solicitor or notary can prosecute such 
an undertaking. It requires a briefless advocate like 
me — an advocate of solid and sterling capacity, who is 
devoted to his client, and whose position is, unfortu- 
nately, such as to place him on a level with the kind of 
persons to whom I have alluded. My business lies 
wholly with the small shop-keepers, artisans and com- 
mon people of my arrondissement. Yes, madame ; such 
are the straits to which I have been reduced by the 
enmity of a procurator-royal, who is at the present 
moment assistant procurator-royal here in Paris. He 
never forgave me my advantage over him. I know you, 
madame ; I know the solidity of your patronage, and I 
saw, in this service to be rendered to you, the termina- 
tion of my suffering,' and the triumph of my friend. 
Doctor Poulain — ” 

Fraisier stopped ; but Mme. Camusot, absorbed in 
thought, did not open her lips. It was a moment of 
fearful anguish to Fraisier. 

Vinet, one of the orators of the centre, who had been 
procurator-general for sixteen years, and had been men- 
tioned over and over again as likely to be appointed to 
the chancellorship, was the father of Vinet, the former 
procurator of Mantes, who for the last twelve months 
had held the post of assistant procurator- royal at Paris.! 


28r> FRAISTKR IN BLOSSOM.” 

Now Vinet, the father, was an antagonist of the rancor- 
ous Mme. Camusot — for the haughty procurator-general 
took no pains whatever to conceal his contempt for 
President Camusot. This, however, was a circum- 
stance which Fraisier did not and could not know. 

“ Have you nothing to reproach yourself with beyond 
the fact of having acted for both parties in a certain 
case?" inquired Mme. Camusot, looking fixedly at 
Fraisier. 

“Madame la Presidente can have an interview with 
Monsieur Leboeuf ; Monsieur Leboeuf took my part." 

“ Are you sure that Monsieur Leboeuf will give a good 
account of you to Monsieur de Marville and Monsieur le 
Comte Popinot ?" 

“I will answer for that ; especially as Monsieur Olivier 
Vinet is no longer at Mantes ; for between you and me 
the worthy Monsieur Leboeuf had a secret dread of that 
little magistrate. Moreover, with your permission, 
Madame la Presidente, I will go to Mantes and see 
Monsieur Leboeuf. That will not occasion any delay, 
since two or three days must elapse before I can learn 
the exact value of the succession. It is my wish and it 
is my duty to conceal from Madame la Presidente all 
the secret springs of this affair ; but is not the reward 
which I expect for my devotion to your interests a 
guarantee for my success ?" • 

“Very well, then, get Monsieur Leboeuf to say a good 
word for you, and if the succession be so considerable 
as you represent it — and I must confess I have my 
doubts upon the point — I promise you the two 
appointments — in case you succeed, be it always under- 
stood — " 

“I answer for our success, madame. Only you will 
be so good as to send for your notary and solicitor 


287 


FRAISIEK IN BLOSSOM.” 

when I require their aid ; to furnish me with a letter of 
attorney, enabling me to act in the name of Monsieur le 
President ; and to direct those two gentlemen to follow 
my instructions and not to undertake anything on their 
own account.” 

“The responsibility rests entirely on your shoulders,” 
said Mme. Camusot, solemnly ; “ you must be plenipo- 
tentiary. But is Monsieur Pons very ill ?” she inquired, 
with a smile. 

“ Indeed, madame, he might recover, especially since 
he ia. attended by a man so conscientious as Doctor 
Poulain ; for my friend is a perfectly innocent spy, act- 
ing under my directions in your interests, madame ; he 
is quite capable of saving the old musician. But, by 
the bedside of the patient there is a portress who, to 
gain thirty thousand francs, would push him into his 
grave — I don’t mean that she would actually murder 
him, that she would give him arsenic, for instance ; no, 
she will not be so charitable as that ; she will do worse; 
she will morally assassinate him by causing him a thous- 
and fits of irritability in the course of the day. In the 
country, surrounded by silence and tranquillity, well 
nursed and cared for by attentive friends, the poor old 
man would pull round again ; but, plagued as he is by 
a Madame Everard, who in her youth was one of the 
thirty pretty oyster-girls whom Paris has rendered 
famous — a covetous, garrulous, coarse creature, who 
tries to torment him into making a will under which 
she would come in for a good round sum — the sufferer 
will inevitably be attacked by induration of the liver — 
it is possible that calculi are already forming in it — and 
the necessary result will be an operation to extract them, 
which the patient will not survive. The doctor — a 


288 “ FKAISIER IN BLOSSOM.” 

noble fellow — is in a fearful position. He ought to get 
this woman dismissed — ” 

“ But this Megaera must be a perfect monster,” 
exclaimed Mme. Camusot, assuming her melodious 
falsetto. 

This parallelism between the terrible Mme. Camusot 
and himself was a source of silent amusement to 
Fraisier ; he well knew what to make of these sweet, 
factitious modulations of a voice that was naturally 
dissonant. He was irresistibly reminded of a certain 
president, the hero of one of Louis the Eleventh’s 
stories — a story that in its last phrase unmistakably 
bears that monarch’s imprimatur. The president in 
question was blessed with a wife cut out on the genuine 
Xantippe pattern ; but not being gifted with the philo- 
sophic temperament of Socrates, he caused salt to be 
mingled with his horses’ oats, and ordered that no 
water should be given to them. When his wife was 
traveling along the banks of the Seine to her country 
seat, the horses rushed to the water to drink and took 
her with them ; whereupon the magistrate returned 
thanks to God for having so norturally relieved him of 
his better half. At the present moment Mme. de 
Marville was offering thanks to God for having planted 
by Pons’ side a woman who could relieve her of him so 
honorably. 

“ I would not care even for a million if it must cost 
me the slightest loss of honor. Your friend should 
enlighten Monsieur Pons and get this portress sent 
away.” 

“In the first place, madame. Messieurs Schmucke and 
Pons believe this woman to be an angel, and would 
dismiss my friend instead of her. In the second place, 
this atrocious oyster-woman is the doctor’s benefactress ; 



“ THAT IS THE VERY KERNEL OF THE MATTER,” SAID FRAZIER. -See Paqe 291 









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289 


“ FKAISIER IN BLOSSOM.” 

she it was who introduced him to Monsieur Pillerault. 
Poulain directs the woman to be as gentle as possible to 
the patient, but his very recommendations point out to 
the creature the means of aggravating the malady.” 

“What does your friend think of my cousin’s 
condition?” inquired’ Mme. Camusot. 

The precision of Fraisier’s answer and the perspi- 
cacity which he displayed in penetrating the innermost 
thoughts of a heart that was as avaricious as Dame 
Cibot’s, made Mme. Camusot quake. 

“ In six weeks,” said Fraisier, “the succession will fall 
in.” 

Mn»e. Camusot looked down. 

“ Poor man !” said she, vainly endeavoring to assume 
a sympathetic air. 

“ Has Madame la Presidente any commands for 
Monsieur Leboeuf ? I shall at once take train for Mantes.” 

'^‘Yes; just wait where you are for a minute ; I will 
write and ask him to dine with us to-morrow ; I want to 
see him, and make an arrangement with him whereby 
the injustice from which you have suffered may be 
redressed.” 

When Mme. Camusot had left the room, Fraisier, who 
saw himself already clothed with the dignity of juge de 
paix^ was no longer like the same man ; he seemed to 
have grown stout ; he inhaled deep draughts of the 
atmosphere of happiness and the favoring breezes of 
prosperity. He imbibed from the hidden fountains of 
Will fresh and potent doses of that divine essence ; like 
Remonencq, he felt that, to attain his ends, he would 
not shrink from committing a crime, provided only that 
it left behind it no evidence of its commission. In the 
presence of Mme. Camusot he had displayed a bold front, 
turning conjecture into reality, and making random 


290 


“ FRAISIEU IN BLOSSOM.” 

assertions witli the single object of getting her to intrust 
him with the salvage of this succession, and securing her 
influence. Representative as he was of two intense 
miseries and two aspirations equally intense, he spurned 
with a disdainful foot his squalid dwelling in the Rue 
de la Perle. A fee of three thousand francs from Dame 
Cibot, a fee of five thousand francs from the president 
loomed in the distance. There was enough to provide 
him with a decent abode ! And, to crown all, he would 
be able to discharge his debt of obligation to Dr. 
Poulain ! 

Some of those harsh anti vindictive characters whom 
suffering or illness has rendered spiteful are capable of 
exhibiting with equal violence sentiments of a totally 
opposite description. Richelieu was as good a friend as 
he was a cruel foe. Even so Fraisier’s gratitude to 
Poulain, for the aid which the doctor had afforded him, 
was such that he would have allowed himself to be 
hacked to pieces to do Poulain a good turn. 

When Mme. Camusot returned to the room with a 
letter in her hand, and (unobserved by Fraisier) had a 
good view of him as he sat dreaming of a life of happi- 
ness and plenty, she thought him less ugly than he had 
appeared to be at the first glance ; and besides, was he 
not about to render her a service ? We look upon our 
own instrument in a light very different from that in 
which we regard the instrument of our neighbor. 

“ Monsieur Fraisier,” said the lady ; “ you have proved 
to me that you are a man of talent ; I believe that you 
can also be candid.” 

Fraisier replied to this appeal with a most eloquent 
gesture. 

‘‘Well, then,” pursued Mme. Camusot, “I call upon 
you to give me a candid answer to this question : Will 


291 


FRATSIER IN BLOSSOM.’’ 

your measures in any way compromise either Monsieur 
de Marville or myself?” 

“I should not have come to you, madame, if I should 
some day be compelled to reproach myself with having 
thrown any mud on you — were the spot upon your 
reputation no bigger than a pin’s head — fdr there it 
would look as big as the moon. You appear to forget, 
madame, that before I can be made a juge de paix at 
Paris, I must first acquit myself to your satisfaction. I 
have received one lesson in the course of my life. It was 
far too severe to allow me to expose myself to the chance 
of undergoing another such castigation. Now for the 
last word, madame ; all my proceedings, in so far as 
they affect you, shall be submitted to you for your 
approval before they are taken.” 

“ Very good ; here is the letter for Monsieur Leboeuf. 
I now await information as to the Value of the 
succession.” 

“That is the very kernel of the matter,” said Fraisier, 
bowing to Mme. Camusot with all the grace that was 
compatible with his physiognomy. 

“What a merciful dispensation of Providence !” said 
Mme. Camusot de Marville to herself. “Ah ! I shall 
be rich after all ! Camusot will be a deputy ; for if we 
get Fraisier to canvass for us in the arrondissement of 
Bolbec, he will secure us a majority. What an agent !” 

“What a merciful dispensation of Providence !” said 
Fraisier to himself as he descended the staircase ; “and 
what an artful jade is this Madame Camusot ! She is 
just the very woman I wanted to find ! And now to 
business.” 

And away he sped to Mantes, there to win the good 
graces of a man whom he scarcely knew. But Fraisier 
was counting on Mme. Vatinelle — to whom, alas, he 


29 ^ A CAU rlON TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

could trace back all his misfortunes — and there is this 
resemblance between the sorrows of love and the pro- 
tested bill of a substantial debtor ; the latter bears 
interest, and the former inspire it. 


^ CHAPTER XXII. 

“ A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

Three days afterward, while Schmucke was asleep — 
for Mme. Cibot and the old musician had already begun 
to share the burden of nursing and sitting up with the 
sufferer — Dame Cibot had had what she called a bit of 
a tiff with poor Pons. It may be -useful to point out a 
painful peculiarity of hepatitis. Persons who are attacked 
more or less severely with this disease of the liver, are 
apt to be hasty and choleric ; and the liver is momen- 
tarily relieved by these gusts of passion, just as the 
patient, in a sudden access of fever, is conscious of being 
abnormally strong. When the paroxysm is over, a weak- 
ness — which the doctors term collapsus — sets in ; and the 
full extent of the injury sustained by the system then 
becomes apparent. Thus it happens that in diseases of 
the liver, and especially in those which have their origin 
in profound mental suffering, the patient’s fits of irrita- 
tion are followed by exhaustion that is all the more 
dangerous on account of the strict diet to which he is 
subjected. In these cases all the humors of the body 
are agitated by a kind of fever ; for the fever is not in 
the blood nor in the brain. This morbid susceptibility 
of the whole system produces a feeling of depression 


293 


“a caution to old bachelors.’’ 

that makes the sufferer loathsome to himself. In such 
a crisis every trifle causes a dangerous irritation. Now, 
Dame Cibot, a woman of the people, without experience 
and without education, did not believe — spite of the 
admonitions of the doctor — in these tortures inflicted on 
the nervous system by the humors of the body. M. 
Poulain’s explanations were, in her opinion, mere doctors’ 
crotchets. Like all ignorant persons, she was resolutely 
bent on making the patient eat ; and she would have 
secretly fed him on ham, omelets and vanilla chocolate, 
but for the following unqualified declaration from the 
lips of Dr. Poulain : 

“ Give Monsieur Pons but a single mouthful of food, 
and you will kill him as surely as if you fired a pistol at 
him.” 

The obstinacy of the lower classes in this respect is so 
great that the repugnance of the ailing poor to going 
into an hospital arises from the belief that persons are 
starved to death there. The mortality caused by the 
secret supplies of eatables conveyed by women to their 
husbands has been found so great that hospital physicians 
have been compelled to subject to the strictest search all 
those who come on visiting days to see the patients. 
Dame Cibot, with a view to bringing about the 
temporary quarrel that was necessary to the realization 
of her immediate profits, gave her account of her visit to 
the theatre, not omitting her tiff with Mile. Heloise, the 
first lady of the ballet. 

“ But what did you go there for ?” inquired the patient 
for the third time. He found it impossible to stop Mme. 
Cibot when she had once fairly ernbarked upon the 
stream of her eloquence. 

“And then, when I had given her a bit of my mind. 
Mademoiselle Heloise, who saw what I was, caved in, 


294 ‘‘a caution to old bacheloks.” 

and we became the best friends in the world. Now, you 
ask me what I went there for ?” said Dame Cibot, repeat- 
ing Pons’ question. 

There are certain babblers — and these are babblers 
of genius — who glean each interruption, objection and 
remark in this fashion, and store them up as provender 
to feed their talk ; as if it were possible that its fount 
should fail. 

“ Why, I went there to get your Monsieur Gaudissard 
out of a mess ; he’s in want of some music for a ballet, 
and you are in a condition, my darling, to scribble 
away and do what is required of you. So I heard as 
how a Monsieur Garangeot would be called in to set 
‘ The Mohicans ’ to music — ” 

Garangeot r* echoed the furious Pons. Garangeot ! 
a man without a particle of talent ; I wouldn’t have him 
as a first violin ! He has plenty of wit, and writes very 
good musical notices ; but as for composing an air, I 
defy him to do it ! And who the devil put it into your 
head to go to the theatre ?” 

“ What an o' stinate demon it is, to be sure ! Look 
here, my pussy, don’t boil over like milk porridge. 
Could you, I n’ask, write music in the state you’re in ? 
Why, you can’t have seen yourself in the glass. 
Would you like just to have a peep at the glass? Why, 
you’re nothing but skin and bone — you’re''as weak as a 
sparrow — and yet you fancy as you jot down your 
notes — why, you couldn’t even tot up my bills — and, by 
the way, that reminds me that I must send up the third 
floor’s bill ; he owes us seventeen francs, and even seven- 
teen francs is not to be sneezed at ; for, when we’ve paid 
the druggist we sha’n’t have as much as twenty francs 
left. Well, I was bound to tell this man, who seems a 
thorough good fellcfw — a regular Roger Bontemps as 


295 


“ A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.’^ 

would just suit me to a T — {he'll never have the liver 
complaint, he won’t) — well, I was bound, as I was 
a-saying, to let him know how you was. Bless my heart 
and soul, you are far from well, I can tell you, and 
so he has just put some one in your place for a while.” 

Put some one in my place!" exclaimed Pons, in a 
terrific voice, sitting up in bed. 

Sick folks' in general, and especially those who are 
within the compass of Death’s scythe, cling to their sit- 
uations with a tenacity equal to the energy displayed 
by beginners in endeavoring to obtain them. Thus, to 
this poor moribund old man, his supersession seemed a 
kind of preliminary death. 

“But,” pursued he, “the doctor tells me that I am 
going on as well as possible ! and that I shall soon 
return to my old life. You have killed, ruined, assassin- 
ated me !” 

“Tut, tut, tut, tut ! there you go,” exclaimed Dame 
Cibot. “So I’m your destroyer, am I ? These are the 
pretty things you’re always a-saying about me to 
Monsieur Schmucke when my back’s turned. I hear 
what you say, I do ! You’re a monster of ungrati- 
tude !” 

“ But you don’t understand that if I waste even a 
fortnight over my convalescence I shall be told, on 
returning to the theatre, that I am an old fogy, a 
veteran ; that my day has gone by, that I am a relic of 
the Empire, a fossil, a guy !” cried this invalid who 
panted for life. “ Garangeot will have been making 
friends from the box-office up to the very cradling of 
the theatre ! He has lowered the pitch for some actress 
without a voice ; he has licked Monsieur Gaudissard’s 
shoes ; he has got his friends to praise everybody in the 
newspaper critiques ; yes, and in a shop like that, ' 


296 “a caution to old bachelors.” 

Madame Cibot, people will find hair upon a billiard-ball! 
What devil was it that inspired you with the idea of 
going to the theatre?” 

“Why, goodness gracious me ! Haven’t I and 
Monsieur Schmucke been talking the matter over for 
the last week? What would you n’have, I’d like to 
know ? You’ve no thought for any one but yourself. 
You’re that selfish that you’d kill other /oiks to cure 
yourself ! Why, there’s that poor Monsieur Schmucke 
has been a-wearing his very life out for the last month ; 
he’s worn his very feet off his legs ; he can’t go out 
anywhere now to give lessons or do duty at the theatre; 
why, you don’t notice anything that goes on ! He 
looks after you at night as I do during the day-time. 
Why, if I’d gone on a-setting up with you at night, as I 
tried to do at first, thinking, as I did, as there was 
scarce anything the, matter with you, I should now have 
to lie in bed the whole blessed day long ! And who’d 
look after the house and the larder then, I should 
like to know ? Pray, what on earth would you have ? 
Illness is illness, and there’s an end of the busi- 
ness !” 

“It’s impossible for Schmucke to have had such an 
idea — ” 

“Now, I suppose you want to make -out that it was 
me as took it into my head ? What ? D’ye think as 
we’re made of iron ? Why, if Monsieur Sohmucke had 
carried on his business by going and giving seven or 
eight blessed lessons, and spending the evening at the 
theatre a-directing of that there orchestra from half 
past six till half past eleven, he’d have been carried off 
in ten days. Do you want the worthy man to die, him 
as would shed his blood (or you ? By the authors of 
my being, there never was such a patient as you I 


“ A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELOKS.’’ 297 

What have you done with your wits? Have you taken 
’em to the Mont-de-Pi6te and pledged ’em ? Every 
one here does their utmost for you, and yet you’re dis- 
contented ! Why, you must want to drive us stark, 
staring mad ; I’m quite done up as it is without any 
further trouble !” 

Dame Cibot’s rhetoric might flow unchecked ; indig- 
nation had tied poor Pons’ tongue. He turned and 
twisted about in his bed, and feebly articulated a few 
ejaculations. In point of fact, he was dying. 

But now that the quarrel had reached this pitch, a 
sudden change supervened, and a tender scene ensued. 
The nurse threw herself upon the patient, and placing 
her hands upon his head, compelled him to lie down, 
and drew the bedclothes over him. 

“ How on earth can people work themselves into such 
a stage ? After all, my pussy, it’s only your complaint. 
It’s just as worthy Monsieur Poulain says. Come now, 
do be quiet. Do be pleasant, my good little fellow. 
You’re the idol of every one as comes anywhere near 
you — why, the doctor himself comes to see you twice a 
day ! What would he say if he found you in this state 
of n’excitement ? You throw me quite off my hinges ! 
It ain’t right of you to do so — indeed it ain’t. When 
one has Mother Cibot for a nurse one ought to behave 
decently to her — you shout and talk, and you know 
that it’s forbidden. Talking n’irritates you. And why 
lose your temper? You’re n’altogether in the wrong — 
you’re always a-flustering me ! Come now, let’s just 
argue the point rationally ! If Monsieur Schmucke and 
I — who love you n’as I love my own little bowels — 
thought that we was a-doing the correct thing ! well, 
my cherub, that’s all right, ain't it ?” 


298 A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

“ It’s impossible that Schmucke can have told you to 
go to the theatre without consulting 

“Am I to go and wake the poor fellow who’s sleeping 
like the just, and call him to witness ?” 

“ No ! no !” exclaimed Pons. “ If my good and affec- 
tionate Schmucke came to that decision, I am, perhaps, 
worse than I thought I was.” Here Pons cast a glance 
of intense melancholy at the objects of art which adorned 
his chamber, and added : 

“ Then I suppose I must bid adieu to my dear pic- 
tures, to all those things which I have come to regard 
as friends. Oh, can it be true ? can it be true ?” 

At these words Dame Cibot — that atrocious actress — 
placed her handkerchief before her eyes. This mute 
response plunged the sufferer into a sombre reverie. 
Beaten down by these two blows — the loss of his berth 
and the prospect of death — planted as they were in such 
sensitive spots — his social position and the condition of 
his health — he sunk into a state of exhaustion so extreme, 
that, lacking strength to be angry, he lay sad and still, 
like a consumptive man whose final pangs are over, and 
from whom life is ebbing placidly away. 

Seeing that her victim was entirely subdued. Dame 
Cibot said to him : “ Let me tell you, in Monsieur 
Schmucke’s interests, as you would do well to send for 
the notary of the district — Monsieur Trognon, who n*is 
a very worthy man.” 

“ You are always talking to me about this Trognon,” 
said the sick man. 

“ Oh ! well, it’s all one to me — he or n’any one else — 
for anything that you will leave 7?ie T* 

The portress tossed her head by way of showing her 
supreme contempt for riches ; and silence was restored. 

At this moment Schmucke, who had been asleep for 


A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS ” 299 

more than six hours, was awakened by a sensation of 
hunger, and, getting out of bed, came into Pons’ room 
and gazed at him for some moments in silence ; for Mme. 
Cibot had placed her finger on her lips and whispered : 
‘‘ Hush !” She then left her seat, and going close up to 
the German, in order that she might breathe her words 
into his ear, said : “ Thank God ! he’s a-going to sleep 
now ; he’s as vicious as a red donkey !” 

“ What can you egspect ; he is to pe excused on de 
score of his illness — ” 

“No; on the contrary, I’m extremely patient,” inter- 
posed the victim, in a doleful voice which betrayed 
terrible exhaustion. “ But, my dear Schmucke, she has 
positively been to the theatre to get me dismissed — ” 

He paused for lack of strength to continue. Dame 
Cibot took advantage of the pause to indicate to 
Schmucke by means of a gesture the state of a man’s 
head when his wits are wandering, and said : 

“ Don’t contradict him ; it would be the death of him.” 

“And she pretends,” continued Pons, looking at the 
honest German, “ that it you who sent her there.” 

“ Yez,” replied the heroic Schmucke, “ it was nezezzary. 
Don’t speag — allow uz to safe you ! It is folly to wear 
yourzelf out wid work when you have a treazure ; ged 
well again, and we will zell some brig-a-brag, and we 
will end our lifes quiedly in zome znug corner, with this 
goot Montame Zipod to look after us — ” 

“ She has bewitched you !” said Pons, in lugubrious 
accents ; then, thinking that Mme. Cibot had left the 
room since he had lost sight of her — she had placed her- 
self behind the bedstead so that she might make signs 
to Schmucke without being seen by Pons — the patient 
added : “ She assassinates me !” 

“What ?” exclaimed Dame Cibot, with flaming eyes, 


300 A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELOKS.” 

and arms akimbo, I assassinate you, do I ? So that's the 
reward I get for being as faithful to you as a poodle 
dog ! Good God Almighty !” And bursting into tears, 
she sunk into an arm-chair — a tragical movement which 
gave Pons a fatal turn. “ Well,” said she, rising from 
the chair, and glaring at the two friends with the eye of 
an enraged woman — eyes that seem to emit at once 
pistol-shots and poison — “ well. Pm sick and tired of 
slaving myself to death here without giving satisfaction. 
You shall hire a nurse !” (At these words the two 
friends looked at each other in dismay.) “ Oh, yes, it’s 
all mighty fine for you to look at each other like a couple 
of actors. I mean what I say. I goes and I asks Doctor 
Poulain to find you a nurse ; and we’ll settle our accounts 
together. You’ll repay me the money as Pve spent in 
these here rooms, and that Pd never have asked you for 
again — me as went to Monsieur Pillerault to borrow 
another five hundred francs.” 

“ It’s his melaty,” said Schmucke, rushing up to Mme. 
Cibot, and putting his arm round her waist. “ Do be 
batient !” 

“ Oh, as for you, you’re an angel ; I could kiss the 
very ground you tread upon,” said she. ‘‘ But Monsieur 
Pons never liked me ; he w' always hated me. Besides, 
he may think as I wants to be remembered in his will.” 

“ Hush ! you are going de way to kill him,” said 
Schmucke. 

“ Good-bye, monsieur !” said Dame Cibot, going up 
to Pons and darting at him a withering glance. “ For 
all the ill-will I bears you, may you get well again. 
When you can be kind to me and can believe as what I 
do is for the best. I’ll come back again. Till then I 
shall just stay at home. You were my child ; since 
when have you seen children turn round upon their own 


CA-UTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 301 

mothers ? No, no, Monsieur Schmucke, I won’t listen 
to a single word. I’ll bring you your dinner and wait 
uponyi7//y but you must get a nurse for Monsieur Pons ; 
ask Monsieur Poulain to find you one.” 

And she flounced out of the room, slamming the 
doors behind her with so much violence that the frail 
and precious wgrks of art shook again. 

The sufferer heard the clatter of porcelain — and to 
him, in his torture, the sound was what the coup de grdce 
used to be to those who were broken on the wheel. 

An hour afterw'ard Dame Cibot, instead of coming to 
Pons’ bedside, called to Schmucke through the bedroom- 
door to tell him that his dinner was ready for him in 
the dining-room. Thither the poor German repaired 
with wan face and weeping eyes. 

“ My boor Rons is bezide himzelf,” said he ; “for he 
makes out that you are a fillain. It’s his disease,” 
added he, in order to soothe Dame Cibot, without 
accusing Pons. 

“ Oh ! I’ve had quite enough of his disease ! Hear 
what I have to say ; he’s neither father, husband, 
brother, nor child of mine ; and he’s taken a dislike to 
me ; well, that’s quite enough for me! As for you, 
n’l’d follow you'v\. to the other end of the world, look 
you ; but when one gives one’s life, one’s heart, and all a 
body’s savings and neglects a body’s husband — which 
there’s Cibot ill — and then hears one’s self called a 
villain — why that coffee’s a little too strong for my 
liking — ” 

“ Goffee ?” 

“ Yes, coffee, I say ! But don’t let’s waste breath 
in idle talk ; let’s come to plain matters of fact. Well, 
then, you owes me for three months at a hundred and 
ninety francs a month; that makes five hundred and 


302 A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

seventy francs ; then there’s the rent as I’ve paid twice 
— which here’s the receipts — six hundred francs includ- 
ing the sou per livre and taxes ; that’s well-nigh twelve 
hundred francs ; then, there’s the two thousand francs, 
without interest, you understand ; in all, three thousand 
one hundred and ninety-two francs. And then, con- 
sider, you ought to have at least two thousand francs in 
hand to pay for the nurse and the doctor and medicine 
and the nurse’s victuals. That’s why I borrowed a 
thousand francs from Monsieur Pillerault.” And with 
these words she produced the two twenty-pound notes 
that Gaudissard had given her. 

Schmucke listened to this financial statement with an 
astonishment that can easily be conceived ; for he knew 
as much about money matters as a cat knows about 
music. 

“ Montame Zipod, Bons is not in his zenzes. Egscuse 
him, gontinue to nurze him, gontinue to be our Bro- 
videnze — I entreat you on my knees.” 

And the German prostrated himself before Dame 
Cibot and kissed the hands of this savage. 

“ Listen to me, my good pussy,” said she, raising 
Schmucke from the ground, and kissing him on the fore- 
head ; “ Here’s Cibot laid up ; he’s in bed ; I’ve just 

sent for Dr. Poulain to him. Under these circumstances 
I must put my affairs in trim. Besides which, when 
Cibot saw me go back to the lodge crying, he up and 
flew into such a rage that he’s against letting me put 
my foot inside this place again. It’s he as is a-asking 
for his money, and after all it is his^ you know ! We 
women have nothing to do with such matters. But pay- 
ing him his money — three thousand two hundred francs 
— that’ll keep him quiet perhaps. It’s his whole fortune, 
poor man, his savings during twenty-six years house- 


303 


“ A CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

keeping, the fruits of the sweat of his brow. He 7nust 
have his money to-morrow, it’s no use shuffling about 
the business. You don’t know Cibot ; when he is angry 
he’s quite capable of committing murder. Well ! I may, 
perhaps, manage to get him to allow me to go on attend- 
ing on you two. Make your mind easy, I’ll let him go 
on at me as much as ever he chooses ; I’ll suffer that 
martyrdom ior your sake — for you’re an angel, you are.” 

“ No, I am only a boor man who lofes his friend, and 
woot gife his life to zave him.” 

“Yes, but how about money? My good Monsieur 
Schmucke, let’s suppose you don’t give me a farthing, 
still, you must scrape together three thousand francs 
for your n’actual wants. Goodness me, do you know 
what I’d do if I were in your shoes ? I wouldn’t make 
any bones about it ; but I’d just take and sell seven or 
eight wretched pictures and stick some of those as are in 
your room, with their faces turned to the wall, in their 
places ; for one picture’s just as good as another, isn’t 
it ?” 

“But why should I do dat ?” asked Schmucke. 

“Why, you see, he’s that artful — of course, I know it’s 
all along of his complaint, for when he’s well, he’s a 
regular lamb — that he might take it into his head to get 
up and ferret about, and if it happens he should get as 
far as the saloon, although to be sure he’s that weak 
that he can't cross the threshold of his door, he’d find 
the number of pictures all right !” 

“ Dat is quite true,” said Schmucke. 

“ But we’ll tell him about the sale of the pictures when 
he’s got quite well again. If you want to make a clean 
breast of the sale, you can lay the whole blame on my 
shoulders, on the needeessity of paying me. Come, my 
back is broad enough — ” 


304 CAUTION TO OLD BACHELORS.” 

“I gan not dizpoze of things, which do not pelong to 
me,” replied the worthy German, with simplicity. 

“ Well, then, I shall summons you at once, you and 
Monsieur Pons.” 

“Why, dat will kill him — ” 

“ Make your choice ! Sell the pictures, good God ! 
and tell him afterward — you can show him the summons.” 

“ Ferry veil, zummons us — that will be my egscuze — 
I will show him de judgment.” 

At seven o’clock in the evening of that very day 
Schmucke was called out by Madame Cibot who, in the 
interim, had consulted a bailiff. The German found 
himself confronted by Monsieur Tabareau, who 
demanded payment of the amount due ; and when 
Schmucke, with fear and trembling, had made his answer 
to the demand, he was served with a summons calling 
upon himself and Pons to appear before the tribunal and 
listen to judgment for the amount due. The aspect of 
this official and of the stamped paper scribbled with 
hieroglyphics produced so great an effect on Schmucke 
that he offered no further resistance to the sale. 

“Zell de bigdures,” said he, with tears in his eyes. 

At six o’clock next morning, Elie Magus and Remon- 
encq were busy unhooking the pictures which they had 
respectively chosen. Two strictly formal receipts, for 
two thousand five hundred francs each, were given in 
the following terms : “ I, the undersigned, acting on 
behalf of Monsieur Pons, do hereby acknowledge the 
receipt of the sum of two thousand five hundred francs 
from Monsieur Elie Magus for four pictures sold to him 
by me ; the said sum being to be employed on behalf 
of Monsieur Pons. One of these pictures, which is 
ascribed to Durer, is the portrait of a woman ; the 
second, which is of the Italian school, is also a portrait ; 


305 


“a caution to old bachelors.” 

the third is a Dutch landscape by Breughel ; and the 
fourth a Florentine picture representing ‘The Holy 
Family,’ by an unknown master.” 

The receipt given by Remonencq was couched in the 
same terms, and comprised a Greuze, a Claude 
Lorrain, a Rubens and a Van Dyck, disguised under 
the description of pictures of the French and Flemish 
schools. 

“ Dis money would make one belief that dese gewgaws 
are worth zomething,” said Schmucke, when the five 
thousand francs were handed to him. 

“Oh ! the collection is certainly worth something ; I 
would willingly give a hundred thousand francs for the 
lot,” said Remonencq. 

The Auvergnat was asked to replace the eight pictures 
by an equal number of pictures of similar size. This 
little service he performed by making a selection from 
among the inferior pictures which Pons had placed in 
Schmucke’s room, and fixing them in the empty frames. 
When once Elie Magus had the four masterpieces safely 
in his possession, he induced Madame Cibot to accom- 
pany him to his house, under the pretext that they had 
to square accounts. But as soon as she was there, he 
began to plead poverty ; he found flaws in the pictures, 
said that it would be necessary to put new backs to 
them, and concluded by offering her a commission of 
thirty thousand francs only. This he prevailed on her 
to accept by flourishing before her eyes those dazzling 
bits of paper on which the bank has engraved the magic 
words Milk Francs I Magus decreed that Remonencq 
should give a like sum to Dame Cibot — which sum he 
lent to Remonencq on the security of a deposit of his 
four pictures. These four pictures of Remonencq’s 
seemd to Magus so magnificent that he could not make 


f 


806 caution to old bachelors.” 

up his mind to part with them ; so the next day he went 
to the broker, and paid him six thousand francs by way 
of premium ; whereupon Remonencq gave him a sale 
note making the four pictures over to him. 

Madame Cibot, who was now worth sixty-eight 
thousand francs, once more swore her two co-conspira- 
tors to the profoundest secrecy. She begged the Jew to 
tell her how so to invest her money that no one should 
know that she possessed it. 

“Buy"shares in the Orleans railway. They are now 
thirty francs below par ; you will double your capital 
within three years, and your money will be in the form 
of a few scraps of paper, which you can keep in a 
portfolio.” 

“ Stay here. Monsieur Magus, while I go to the agent 
of Monsieur Pons’ family ; he wants to know what sum 
you would give for all the rattle-traps up yonder ; I will 
go and bring him to you.” 

“Ah ! if she were only a widow !” said Remonencq 
to Magus. “She would exactly suit me, for she is rich 
now — ” 

“ Especially it she puts her money into Orleans 
railway stock ; it will be doubled in two years time. I 
have invested my little savings in it ; 'tis my daughter’s 
portion,” said the Jew. “ Come, let’s take a turn 
upon the boulevard, while we are waiting for the advo- 
cate — ” 

“ If God would but take Cibot, who is already very 
unwell,” said Remonencq, “ I should have a glorious 
wife to keep my shop for me, and might go in for busi- 
ness on a large scale.” 


“SCHMUCKE KISES TO HEAVEN.” 307 

] 

I 

/ 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

“ IN WHICH SCHMUCKE RISES TO THE THRONE OF GOD." 

“ Good-day, dear Monsieur Fraisier,” said Dame 
Cibot, in a wheedling voice, as she entered her counsel’s 
study. “Well, and what is this as your portress tells 
me — that you are going to leave this place ?’’ 

“ Yes, my dear Madame Cibot, I have taken the first- 
floor rooms in the house occupied by Dr. Poulain. 
They are the rooms immediately above his. I want to 
borrow from two to three thousand francs, in order 
that I may furnish the suite properly ; for it is really 
very handsome ; the landlord has re-decorated it 
throughout. As I told you, I am now intri^^ted with' 
the interests of the President de Marville, as well as 
with yours. I am on the point of giving up the busi- 
ness of a general agent, and am about to be placed upon 
the roll of advocates ; so I must be well housed. The 
advocates of Paris won’t allow any one to be enrolled 
unless he has decently furnished apartments, a library, 
and* so forth. I am a doctor of laws, I have completed 
my term of probation, and have already secured some 
influential patrons. Well, and how do we stand 
now ?“ 

' “ Will you accept my little hoard ? It is in the sav- 
ings bank,” said Dame Cibot. “I haven’t much — only 
three thousand francs — the fruit of twenty-five years 
pinching and scraping — you could give me a bill of 
- exchange, as Remoneneq puts it ; for as for me, 





308 “SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

I’m quite ignorant, I know naught but what I’m 
^old.” 

■'No ; the statutes of the order of advocates forbid a 
member of the order to put his name to a bill of 
exchange ; I will give you a receipt bearing interest at 
five per cent., and you can return it to me if I succeed in 
getting you an annuity of twelve hundred francs out of 
old Pons’ estate.” 

Dame Cibot, caught in the trap, held her tongue. 

“Silence gives consent,” pursued Fraisier. “Bring 
me the money to-morrow.” 

“ Oh ! I shall be only too glad to pay you your fees 
fn advance ; it’s a way of making sure of my n’annuity,” 
said Dame Cibot. 

“Where are .we now?” said Fraisier, nodding his 
head affirmatively. “ I saw Poulain yesterday evening ; 
it would seem that you are leading your patient along 
at a very pretty pace. One more onslaught like that of 
yesterday^ and stones will begin to form in the gall 
bladder. Now, do be gentle with him, dear Madame 
Cibot ; it doesn’t do to lay up a stock of remorse. It 
shortens life.” 

“ Don’t talk to me n’about your remorse. I suppose 
you’re going to cram your guillotine down my throat 
again ! Monsieur Pons is an o'stinate old fellow ! 
You don’t know him ! It’s he as makes me cut up rough. 
There’s no man living more malicious than he is. His 
relations were quite right ; he’s sullen, revengeful and 
o'stinate! Monsieur Magus is at the house, as I told 
you, and is a-waiting for you.” 

“ Good ! I shall be there as soon as you are. The 
amount of your annuity depends upon the value of this 
collection. If it turns put to be worth eight hundred 


“SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 309 

thousand francs, your annuity will be fifteen hundred 
francs — why, it’s a fortune !” 

“Well, I’ll go and tell them to value the things hon- 
estly.’’ 

An hour later, while Pons (under the influence of a 
sedative draught ordered by the doctor, and admin- 
istered by Schmucke, but doubled in quantity by Dame 
Cibot without Schmucke’s knowledge) was buried in a 
profound slumber, those three gallows-birds — Fraisier, 
Remonencq and Magus — were engaged in examining, 
piece by piece, the seventeen hundred objects of 
which the old musician’s collection was composed. 
Schmucke had gone to bed ; so these three ravens, 
on the scent of their carrion, were masters of the situa- 
tion. 

“ Don’t make a noise,’’ exclaimed Dame Cibot when- 
ever Magus grew enthusiastic and entered into a dis- 
cussion with Remonencq while enlightening the latter 
as to the value of some beautiful work of art. 

The sights of these four different cupidities appraising 
theirsuccession, during the slumbers of him whose death 
was the object of their greedy expectations was enough 
to rend the heart. The valuation of the property con- 
tained in the saloon occupied three hours. 

“ Every object here is worth, on an average, a thous- 
and francs,’’ said the greasy old Jew. 

“ Why, that makes seventeen hundred thousand 
francs !’’ cried the astounded Fraisier. 

“Not to me,” pursued Magus, whose eyes grew sud- 
denly cold and steel-like. “ I would not give more than 
eight hundred thousand francs ; since it is impossible to 
say how long one might have to keep the things on 
hand. There are some masterpieces here which it 
would take ten years to get rid of ; so that the cost 


310 


‘‘SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

price is doubled at compound interest ; but I would 
give eight hundred thousand francs ready money.” 

“ There are some enamels, and some gold and silver 
snuff-boxes, and some miniatures and stained glass, 
besides,” remarked Remonencq. 

“ Can we look at them ?” asked Fraisier. 

“ I’ll just step in and see if he’s fast asleep,” replied 
Dame Cibot ; and, at a sign from her, the three birds 
of prey entered the bedroom. 

“The masterpieces are there^' said Magus, pointing to 
the saloon, while every hair in his white beard quivered, 
“ but here are the riches ! And what riches they are, 
too ! Monarchs have nothing finer among their treas- 
ures.” 

At sight of the snuff-boxes the eyes of Remonencq 
kindled and shone like a pair of carbuncles ; while 
Fraisier, cool and calm as a serpent erect upon its tail, 
thrust forward his flat head, and assumed the attitude 
in which painters are wont to depict Mephistopheles. 
These three contrasted money-grubbers, each of whom 
thirsted for gold as devils thirst for the dews of Paradise, 
cast an unconcerted but simultaneous glance at the 
owner of all this wealth ; for Pons had made a move- 
ment in his sleep, as of one troubled with the night- 
mare. 

Suddenly, under the magnetic influence of these three 
diabolic rays, the patient opened his eyes, and began to 
utter piercing shrieks. 

“ Thieves ! Thieves ! Look ; there they are,” shouted 
he. “ Police ! Murder !” 

It was clear that his dream had not been cut short, 
though he was wide awake ; for he had started up in 
bed, with eye§ diluted, blank and motionless, and could 
not stir. 


311 


‘^SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

Elie Magus and Remonencq made for the door, but 
having reached it they were nailed to the spot by the 
words : 

“ Magus here ! — I am betrayed,” 

The sick man had been awakened by his instinct for 
the preservation of his treasure — an instinct which is 
quite as strong as that of self-preservation. 

“ Madame Cibot, who is that gentleman ?” he 
exclaimed, shuddering at the very sight of Fraisier, who 
did not attempt to move. 

“ My stars, how could I shut the door in his face ?’' 
cried the dame, winking at Fraisier, and making a sign 
to him. “ The gentleman came here only a minute since, 
as the representative of your family — ” 

Fraisier rewarded Dame Cibot with a gesture of 
admiration. 

“Yes, monsieur, I came here oh behalf of Madame de 
Marville, her husband and her daughter, to express to 
you their regret ; by the merest chance they, had been 
informed of your illness, and they would like to nurse 
you themselves. They want you to go to Marville for the 
benefit of your health ; Madame la Vicomtesse Popinot 
— the little Cecile of whom you are so fond — will act as 
your nurse there ; she took your part, and has removed 
the misapprehension under which her mother was labor- 
ing.” 

“And so my heirs have sent you here, have they, with 
the most skilful connoisseur, the keenest expert, in all 
Paris, for your guide ?” exclaimed the indignant Pons. 
“ Hah ! the jest is excellent !” pursued he, laughing like 
a madman. “ You have come to appraise my pic- 
tures, my curiosities, my snuff-boxes, my miniatures ! 
Appraise away ! You have a man with you who not 
only knows all about everything of the kind, but can 


312 ‘^SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

purchase too, for he is a millionaire ten times over. 
My dear relations will not have long to wait for my suc- 
cession,” added he, with profound irony ; “ they have 
given me the finishing stroke. Ah, Madame Cibot, you 
call yourself my mother, and you introduce the dealers, 
my rival and the Camusots into my appartments while 
I am asleep — away with you, one and all !” 

And so saying, the poor man, overstimulated by the 
twofold influence of anger and of fear, got out of bed, 
emaciated as he was. 

“ Lean on my arm, monsieur,” said Dame Cibot, rush- 
ing up to Pons, in order to save him from falling ; 
“ pray calm yourself ; the gentlemen are gone.” 

“ I will have a look at the saloon,” said the dying 
man. 

Dame Cibot motioned to the three ravens to take 
flight ; then seizing hold of Pons, she lifted him in her 
arms, as if he had been a feather, and totally disregard- 
ing his cries, put him into bed again ; then seeing that 
the unhappy collector was quite exhausted she went 
and closed the door of the apartments. Pons’ three 
tormentors were still upon the landing ; and when 
Dame Cibot saw them, and overheard Fraisier saying 
to Magus : “ Write me a letter, signed by both of you, 

undertaking to give nine hundred thousand francs down 
for Monsieur Pons’ collection, and we will take care 
that you secure a goodly profit,” she told them to await 
her return. Thereupon, Fraisier whispered a word — 
only a word — which no one caught, into the ear of the 
portress, and went down, with the two dealers, to the 
lodge. 

“Are they gone, Madame Cibot?” said the unhappy 
Pons, when the portress went back to him. 

“Gone? — who?” she inquired. 


‘‘SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 313 

“ Those men.” 

“ What men ? So you've been seeing men now, have 
you?” quoth the dame. “You’ve just had a violent 
attack of fever, and would have thrown yourself out of 
the window if it hadn’t been for me ; and now you keep 
on talking to me about some men. Are you always 
going to be like that ?” 

“ What ! do you mean to say that there wasn’t a per- 
son there just now — a gentleman who said he had been 
sent here by my family ?” 

“Are you going to talk me down again ?” said she. 
‘‘ My word, do you know where you ought to be put ? 
In Charenton ! — you see men — ” 

“Yes, Elie Magus, Remonencq — ” 

“Oh ! as for Remonencq — you may n’have seen him; 
for he came up to tell me as my poor Cibot is so ill that 
I shall have to leave you to yourself to get well again 
as best you can. My Cibot before everybody, look you. 
When my man is ill, / know nothing about n’any one 
else. Do try to keep quiet, and go to sleep for a couple 
of hours, for I’ve told ’em to send for Dr. Poulain, and 
I’ll come back with him. Come now, do drink your 
draught and be prudent.” 

“ Do you mean to tell me there was no one in my 
room standing there — when I woke just now ?” 

“ Noc a soul !” replied she ; “you must have caught 
the reflection of Monsieur Remonencq in your mirrors.” 

“You are right, Madame Cibot,” said the sick man, 
becoming as mild as a lamb. 

“Well! now you are rational — adieu, my cherub; 
keep quiet; I’ll be with you again in an instant.” 

When Pons heard the sound of the shutting of the 
outer door, he summoned up all his remaining strength 
to rise from his bed ; for, said he to himself ; “ They 


314 "'SCHMUCKE KISES TO HEAVEN.” 

are deceiving me. I am being plundered. Schmucke 
is a mere child ; he would allow them to take him and 
tie him in a bag !” 

And the sick man, fired with a desire to clear up the 
fearful scene, which seemed to him too vivid to be a 
mere vision, managed to crawl to the door of his room. 
Opening the door with great difficulty, he found him- 
self in the saloon. There the sight of his beloved pic- 
tures, his statues, his Florentine bronzes and his porce- 
lains revivified him. Robed in a dressing-gown, the 
collector (whose legs were bare while his head was 
burning) continued to make the tour of the two alleys 
formed by the row of credences and bureaus which 
divided the saloon into two equal parts. At the first 
all-embracing glance of the owner’s eye, the objects in 
the museum were counted and the collection seemed 
intact. Pons was just upon the very point of going 
back to bed, when his eye suddenly fell upon a portrait 
by Greuze, in a place that was formerly occupied by 
Sebastian del Piombo’s “ Knight of Malta ” Swift as 
the forked lightning cleaves the stormy sky, suspicion 
flashed across his mind. He looked to the places 
appropriated to his eight principal pictures, and found 
that those pictures had all disappeared to make room 
for others. A black veil suddenly spread itself over 
the poor man’s eyes ; he was seized with a fainting fit, 
and fell upon the floor. So deep was the swoon, that 
Pons lay for two whole hours upon the spot where he 
had fallen, and was found there by Schmucke, when he 
awoke and left his bedroom, to pay a visit to his sick 
friend. It cost Schmucke a world of trouble to raise 
the moribund musician and get him into bed again ; 
but when the words that he addressed to that half- 
inanimate figure received no answer, save a few vague 


“ SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN. 315 

stutterings and a vacant stare, the poor German, 
instead of losing his self-possession, showed himself a 
hero of friendship. Under the influence of despair, this 
child-man was inspired with one of those ideas which 
occur to loving women and to mothers. He warmed 
some finger-napkins — for he managed to find some 
finger-napkins ! — folded some of them round Pons’ 
hands, applied others to the pit of his stomach, then, 
taking the cold damp forehead between his hands he 
invoked life with a potency of volition worthy of 
Apollonius of Tyana. He kissed the eyes of his friend 
just as the Marys of the great Italian sculptors kiss the 
Saviour, in those bass-reliefs which are called pieta. 
These divine efforts, this transfusion of one life into 
another, this labor, as of maternal love and womanly 
passion, were crowned with complete success ; at the 
end of half an hour. Pons had been warmed into the 
likeness of a living man once more ; the light of life 
returned to his eyes ; and the organs of the body, stim- 
ulated by external heat, resumed their functions. 
Schmucke then gave Pons a mixture of barley-water 
and wine, and thereupon the spirit of life infused itself 
into the body, and understanding once more beamed 
upon the brow that had been insensible as stone. Pons 
was now conscious of the sacred self-devotion and 
energetic friendship to which he owed his resurrec- 
tion. 

“ But for you I was a dead man !” said he, as the tears 
of the worthy German — who was crying and laughing 
at one and the same time — fell gently on his face. 

When poor Schmucke, whose strength was now quite 
exhausted, heard these words — words which he had 
waited for in all the delirium of hope, which is, to the 


316 “ SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

full, as potent as the delirium of despair — he collapsed 
like a rent balloon. 

It was now his turn to fall, and sinking into an arm- 
chair, he joined his hands together, and offered thanks to 
God in fervent prayer. In his opinion a miracle had been 
wrought. He did not believe in the efficacy of his 
prayer ; but he did believe in the power of the God 
whom he had invoked. The miracle, however, was, after 
all, a natural phenomenon, often verified by doctors. A 
patient surrounded by a circle of loving friends, and 
nursed by those who are concerned to save his life, will 
recover ; while another, who, in all other respects, is 
similarly situated, but is nursed by hirelings, will suc- 
cumb. Physicians will not admit that this difference is 
the result of spontaneous magnetism ; they attribute the 
beneficial effects to intelligent nursing and faithful obe- 
dience to their injunctions ; but many a mother knows 
full well the virtue of these ardent projections of one 
abiding and persistent wish. 

“ My good Schmucke — ” 

“Don’t talk ; I can understand you wid my heart ; 
reboze yourzelf, reboze yourzelf,” said the musician, 
smiling. 

“ Poor friend ! Noble being ! Child of God — living 
ia God! Sole creature that has ever loved me !” said 
Pons, in broken sentences, and in tones to which his 
voice had never been attuned before. 

The soul, preparing to take flight, poured itself forth 
in these words — words that caused Schmucke almost as 
much delight as love itself has in its power to confer. 

“ Liff ! liff !” he cried. “And I will begome a lion. 
I will work for bod of uz.“ 

“ Listen to me, my good, faithful and admirable 


. ^^SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 317 

friend ; let me speak ; time presses, for I am a doomed 
man ; I shall not survive these reiterated crises.” 

Schmucke wept like a child. 

“Listen to me now,” said Pons ; “ you will have time 
for weeping afterward. As a Christian it is your duty 
to submit. Now, I have been robbed, and Cibot is the 
robber. Before I leave you, I am bound to enlighten 
you on worldly matters of which you know nothing. 
Eight pictures, of considerable value, have been taken.” 

“ Forgiff me ; it was I dat zold dem.” 

“ You r 

“ Yez, said the poor German. “We were zum- 
moned.” 

“ Summoned ? By whom ?” 

“ Wait a moment !” 

Hereupon Schmucke went in search of the stamped 
document left by the bailiff ; and returned with it in his 
hand. 

Pons read the jargon attentively, allowed the paper to 
slip from his hand, and was silent. This keen observer 
of the material products of human skill had hitherto 
neglected the moral aspect of things ; now, at length, he 
counted every thread in the web which Dame Cibot 
had woven. The verve of the artist, the intelligence of 
the pupil of the Academy of Rome, all his youthful 
energy returned to him for a few moments. 

“ My good Schmucke, obey me as a soldier obeys his 
officer. Listen to me ! Go down to the lodge and tell 
this dreadful woman that I should like to see the envoy 
of my cousin the president again ; and that if he doesn’t 
return, my intention is to bequeath my collection to the 
museum ; tell her that ! am on the point of making my 
will.” 


318 


SCHMUOKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

Schmucke performed the commission ; but no sooner 
had he opened his lips than Dame Cibot began to smile. 

“Our dear patient had an attack of raging fever, my 
dear Monsieur Schmucke, and took it n’into his head as 
there was some folks in his room. Ton my word as an 
honest woman no one has been here n’on behalf of our 
dear sufferer’s relations.” 

With this answer Schmucke returned to Pons, and 
repeated it to him word for word. 

“ She is more clever, more cunning, more astute and 
Machiavellian than I imagined,” said Pons, with a smile. 
“ She lies even in her lodge ! Just fancy ; she brought 
hither this very morning a Jew named Elie Magus, 
Remonencq, and a third person whom I do not know, 
but who is more hideous than both the others put 
together. She counted on my being asleep, to appraise 
the value of my succession ; it so happened that I awoke 
and saw the trio poising my snuff-boxes in their hands. 
In short, the stranger said he had been sent here by the 
Camusots ; I entered into conversation with him. That 
infamous Cibot maintained that I was dreaming. My 
good Schmucke, I was dreaming ! I heard the man 
distinctly, he spoke to me ; the two dealers took fright 
and made for the door. Now, I expected Dame Cibot 
would contradict herself ; but my attempt to make her 
do so has failed. I will lay another trap into which the 
wicked woman is sure to fall. You, my poor friend, take 
this Cibot to be an angel ; whereas she is a woman who, 
out of pure greed, has been slowly murdering me during 
the last month. I was loath to believe in the existence 
of so much wickedness in a woman who had served us 
faithfully for several years. That unwillingness has 
been my ruin. How much did you get for the pictures 

“Five thousand francs !” 


‘‘SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 319 

Good God ! they were worth twenty times as much !” 
cried Pons. “ They were the very flower of my collection. 
I have no time to bring an action ; besides, I should 
have to put you forward as the dupe of these scoundrels. 
A lawsuit would be the death of you ! You don't know 
what a court of justice is! 'tis the common sewer of 
every infamy ! Hearts such as yours sicken and 
succumb at the sight of so many horrors. And besides, 
you will be rich enough as matters stand. Those 
pictures cost me four thousand francs, and I have had 
them six-and-thirty years. But we have been robbed in 
the most skilful fashion possible. I am on the brink of 
the grave ; my only care is for you — for you, the best of 
creatures. Now, I will not have you plundered. I say 
you^ because all that I have is yours. Therefore, I tell 
you that you ought to trust no one ; and you have never 
distrusted any one in the whole course ^f your life. 
You are, I know, under God’s protection ; but He may 
forget you for a moment, and then you will be pillaged 
like a merchantman by a pirate. Dame Cibot is a 
monster ; she is killing me ! and you regard her as an 
incarnate angel. Now, I want you to see her in her true 
colors ; so go and beg her to mention the name of a 
notary who will receive my will, and I’ll show her to you 
with her hands in the money-bag.” 

Schmucke listened to Pons as if Pons had been 
relating the Apocalypse. If Pons’ theory were correct, 
and there really existed a being so depraved as Madame 
Cibot must then needs be, her existence was tantamount, 
in Schmucke’s eyes, to a total negation of Providence. 

“ My boor friend Bons is so ill dat he wants to mague 
his will ; go and fetch a notary,” said the German to 
Madame Cibot, as soon as he reached the porter’s lodge. 

These words were uttered in the presence of several 


320 ^'SCHMUCKE RISES TO HEAVEN.” 

persons, for Cibot’s condition was well-nigh desperate ; 
Remonencq, Remonencq’s sister, two portresses who 
had hurried to the scene from neighboring houses, three 
of the servants of the various lodgers in the houses and 
the occupant of the first floor of the street fagade were 
standing in the gate-way. 

“Ah ! You may just go and fetch a notary yourself 
and get your will made by any one you like,” said Dame 
Cibot, with tears in her eyes. “I sha’n’t budge from 
my poor Cibot’s bedside when he’s a-dying. I’d give 
all the Ponses as is in the world to save Cibot — a man 
as never caused me, no, not two ounces of trouble during 
thirty years that we’ve lived together man and wife !’’ 

And she retired into the lodge, leaving Schmucke 
quite dumbfounded. 

“ Monsieur,” said the first-floor lodger to Schmucke, 
is Monsieur Pons so very ill, then?” 

The name of this lodger was Jolivard ; he was a 
registry-clerk in the offices of the Palace of Justice. 

“ He was almost dying a few minutes ago,” replied 
Schmucke, in deep distress. 

“ Monsieur Trognon, the notary, lives close by, in the 
Rue Saint Louis. He is the notary of the Quarter,” 
observed M. Jolivard. 

“Would you like me to go and fetch him?” said 
Remonencq to Schmucke. 

“ I should be ferry clad if you woot,’* replied 
Schmucke ; “ for if Montame Zipod gannot nurze my 
friend, I should <iot like to leaf him in the stade in 
which he is.” 

“ Madame Cibot told us that he was going mad,” 
pursued Jolivard. 

''Bans, mad?'* exclaimed Schmucke, terror-stricken. 



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MADAME riBOT ENSCONCED HERSELF NEAR THE DOOR WHICH SHE LEFT 

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821 


‘^SCHMUCK-E RISES TO HEAVEN.’^ 

“ He never was more zensible in his life ; and it iz just 
dat which magues me uneazy about his health.” 

So keen was the interest which all the members of the 
little group naturally took in this conversation, that it 
remained engraved upon their memories. Schmucke 
did not know Fraisier, and therefore paid no attention 
to his Satanic head and glistening eyes. Fraisier it was, 
who, by whispering two words in Madame Cibot’s ear, 
had prompted the wonderful scene that she had acted — 
a scene the conception of which was, perhaps, beyond 
the range of her unaided abilities, but which she had 
played with all the superiority of a master in the art. 
To make Pons pass for a lunatic was one of the corner- 
stones of the edifice built by the homme de loi. That 
morning’s incident had been of immense service to 
Fraisier; and, but for him, it is possible that Dame 
Cibot might, in her confusion, have betrayed herself 
when the innocent Schmucke came to lay a snare for 
her by begging her to recall the family emissary. 
Remonencq, meanwhile, who saw Dr. Poulain approach- 
ing, w^as only too glad of an excuse for getting away ; 
why, we will proceed to explain. 


322 


«the tricks of a testator.” 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

** THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.” 

Remonencq had, for the last ten days, taken upon him- 
self to play the part of Providence — an assumption which 
Is peculiarly distasteful to Dame Justice, who claims a 
monopoly of that role. But Remonencq’s desire was, at 
any cost, to rid himself of the only obstacle that stood 
between him and happiness ; and for him, happiness 
consisted in marrying the attractive portress, and trip- 
ling his capital. Now, the sight of the little tailor 
swallowing his barley-water had suggested to Remon- 
encq the idea of converting the indisposition of his rival 
into a mortal malady. His trade as an old-iron dealer 
supplied him with the means. 

One morning as, with his back leaning against the 
jamb of his shop-door, he was smoking his pipe, and 
dreaming of that splendid shop on the Boulevard de la 
Madeleine, wherein Madame Cibot was to queen it in 
gorgeous attire, Remonencq’s eyes fell upon a copper 
rundle very much oxidized. The idea of economically 
cleansing this rundle in Cibot’s barley-water suddenly 
flashed across his mind ; so having tied a small piece of 
pack-thread to this bit of copper — (which was ab'but as 
large as a crown-piece) — he, every day, while Dame 
Cibot was engaged in attending to her two gentlemen, 
went to the lodge to inquire how his friend the tailor 
was getting on ; and during this visit, which lasted 
several minutes, gave the copper rundle a bath ; and 
when he went away, drew it out of the barley-water by 


323 


“ THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.’’ 

means of the pack-thread. This slight admixture of 
oxidized copper (commonly called verdigris) secretly 
introduced a deleterious element into the health-con- 
ferring barley-water. The proportions of the dose were 
homeopathic, it is true ; but its ravages were incalculable. 
The results of this felonious homeopathy were these : 
upon the third day poor Cibot’s hair began to fall off, 
his teeth began to tremble in their sockets, and the 
whole economy of his system was deranged by these 
imperceptible doses of poison. Doctor Poulain noticed 
the effects of this decoction, and racked his brains in the 
endeavor to detect their cause ; for he was sufficiently 
Skilful to recognize the fact that some destructive agent 
was at work. Clandestinely removing the remainder of 
the barley-water, he analyzed it himself ; but he found 
no foreign substance in it, for as chance would have it, 
Remonencq, scared by the results of his handiwork, had 
refrained on that particular day from introducing the 
fatal rundle into the barley-water. Dr. Poulain satisfied 
the demands of his own conscience, and of science, by 
supposing that, in consequence of a sedentary life, passed 
in a damp lodge, the blood of this tailor, squatted on a 
table in front of that grated window, had grown thor- 
oughly impure, partly from want of exercise, and partly 
(and principally) from the inhalation of the effluvia of a 
fetid gutter ; for the Rue de Normandie is one of those 
old and ill-paved streets into which the municipal 
authorities of Paris have not, as yet, introduced any 
pillar-fountains, and in which the refuse water of the 
houses that line the street is suffered to form a black 
and sluggish stream, and, oozing beneath the paving- 
stones, to create that kind of mud which is peculiar to 
Paris. 

As for Dame Cibot, she trotted hither and thither and 


32-i THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.” 

to and fro ; while her husband, indefatigable toiler as 
he was, was always planted before the widow, in one 
unvarying posture, like a fakir. Hence, the knees of the 
tailor were anchylozed ; the blood had stagnated in the 
bust, while the legs had become so crooked and shrunken 
as to be well-nigh useless. 

Thus the pronounced copper color of Cibot’s com- 
plexion, had, for a long time past, presented the appear- 
ance of natural disease. To Dr. Poulain the wife’s 
excellent health and the illness of her husband consti- 
tuted the most ordinary phenomenon possible. 

“ What can be the matter with my poor Cibot ?” was 
the inquiry addressed by the dame to Dr. Poulain. 

“My dear Madame Cibot,” replied the doctor, “your 
husband is dying of the porter’s disease ; his atrophy 
shows an incurable vitiation of the blood.” 

A crime without an object — a crime inspired by no 
greed of gain, prompted by no motive whatever ! 
These reflections dispelled the suspicions which had 
originally presented themselves to Dr. Poulain’s mind. 
Who could wish for Cibot’s death ? His wife ? Why, 
the doctor had seen her taste her husband’s barley- 
water when she sweetened it. A great many crimes 
escape society’s avenging hand ; principally those which 
resemble that of Remonencq, in being perpetrated with- 
out the appalling proofs supplied by acts of violence, 
such as the effusion of blood, strangling, blows and other 
clumsy devices. In the absence of these, and where the 
crime is without apparent motive, and occurs among 
the lower classes, impunity is all the more likely. A 
crime is always brought to light by its precursors — by 
open hate or patent greed, known to the persons beneath 
whose observation our lives are passed. But situated as 
were the little tailor, Remonencq and Dame Cibot, no 


‘^THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.” 325 

one, save the doctor, had any interest in ferreting out 
the cause of death. The ailing gate-keeper with the 
copper-colored skin, who had no property, and whose 
wife adored him, was without a foe as he was without a 
fortune. The motives by which the broker was actuated, 
the passion which influenced him were (like the fortune 
of Dame Cibot) buried in obscurity. The doctor indeed 
thoroughly understood the portress and the feelings by 
which she was guided ; he believed her quite capable of 
tormenting Pons, but he knew that it was hot her inter- 
est, and that she had not sufficient force of character, to 
commit a crime. Moreover, she swallowed a spoonful 
of the barley-water every time that she gave her hus- 
band his dose, during the doctor’s visits. Poulain, there- 
fore, the only person who could throw any light upon 
the subject, believed that the strange symptoms that had 
attracted his notice were due to some accidental com- 
plications, to one of those extraordinary exceptions 
which render medicine so perilous a calling. And, in 
fact, the state of health of the little tailor, cribbed, 
cabined, and confined as he had been, was so bad that 
this imperceptible addition of oxide of copper was 
enough to put an end to him. The gossips and neigh- 
bors, moreover, acted in such a way as to clear Remon- 
encq from suspicion ; they satisfactorily accounted for 
this sudden death. 

“ Ah,” cried one, “ I said long since, that Monsieur 
Cibot was not in good health.” 

“ He worked a deal too much, did that man ; he over- 
heated his blood,” cried another. 

“ He wouldn’t listen to what I said to him,” exclaimed 
one of the neighbors. “ I advised him to get out on 
Sundays, and make Monday a holiday ; for two holi- 
days a week 9re none too many sure/^.” 


326 “the tricks of a testator.” 

In fact, the rumor of the Quarter, which is so denun- 
ciatory, and to which the Law listens, through the ears 
of the police-officer — that monarch of the lower orders — 
gave a perfectly rational explanation of the death of 
the little tailor. Nevertheless, the pensive look and 
restless eyes of Monsieur Poulain caused Remonencq 
considerable embarrassment ; so, when he saw the 
doctor drawing near, it was with the greatest alacrity 
that he offered to act as Schmucke’s messenger to this 
Monsieur Trognon — whom Fraisier knew. 

“ I shall be back again before the will is made,” 
whispered Fraisier to Dame Cibot. “ Notwithstand- 
ing your trouble, we must keep an eye on the main 
chance.” 

The little solicitor, who whisked away with all the 
lightness of a shadow, met his friend the doctor. 

“Well, Poulain,” said he, “everything is going on 
well. We are safe ! I wHl tell you how^ this evening. 
Choose your post, and you shall have it ! As for me, I 
am a juge de paix. Tabareau won’t withhold his daugh- 
ter from me now. As to you, I undertake to find a wife 
for you in Mademoiselle Vitel, the granddaughter of 
our juge de paix** 

Leaving Poulain plunged in the stupefaction result- 
ing from this language, Fraisier bounded, like a ball, on 
to the boulevard. Hailing an omnibus, he found him- 
self within ten minutes deposited by that coach of 
modern times at the top of the Rue de Choiseul. It 
was about four o’clock, and Fraisier felt certain of find- 
ing Madame de Marville alone ; for the judges hardly 
ever leave the palace before five o’clock. 

Madame de Marville received Fraisier with an 
amount of politeness which showed that M. Leboeuf 
had, in accordance with the promise he had made to 


327 


“ THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.” 

Madame Vatinelle, given a favorable report of the 
quondam solicitor of Mantes. Amelie’s manner to 
Fraisier was almost caressing (just as the Duchesse de 
Montpensier’s must have been to Jacques Clement) — 
for the little solicitor was Madame de Marville’s dag- 
ger. 

But when Fraisier produced the joint letter whereby 
Elie Magus and Remonencq agreed to take the whole 
of Pons’ collection and to give for it a lump sum of 
nine hundred thousand francs in ready money, Mme. de 
Marville directed at the little law-agent a glance 
eloquent of that amount — a perfect wave of avarice that 
rolled to the very feet of the solicitor. 

“Monsieur le President has commissioned me to 
invite you to dine with us to-morrow,” said the lady ; 
“ we shall be quite a family party ; your fellow-guests 
will be Monsieur Godeschal, the successor of my solici- 
tor Maitre Desroches ; Berthier, our notary ; my daugh- 
ter and my son-in-law. After dinner we — that is to 
say, you, I, the notary and the solicitor — will hold the 
little conference which you desired, and will furnish 
you with the necessary powers. Those two gentlemen 
will follow your instructions, as you required, and will 
take care that the whole business is properly conducted. 
You will receive Monsieur de Marville’s power of 
attorney whenever you require it — ” 

“ I shall want it against the day of the demise.” 

“ It shall be held in readiness.” 

“Madame la Presidente,” said Fraisier, “ if I ask for 
a power of attorney, if I desire that your own solicitor 
should not appear in this matter, ’tis not so much in my 
own interests as in yours that I act thus. When I 
devote myself to any one, I devote myself body and 
soul ; and therefore, madame, I expect, in return, the 


328 ^^THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR/' 

same loyalty, the same confidence at the hands of my 
patrons — clients is a word I dare not use in the case of 
yourself and Monsieur de Marville. You might imagine 
that in acting as I am, my object is to keep the affair in 
my own hands ; not so, madame ; but should any repre- 
hensible steps be taken in the matter (for where a suc- 
cession is in question, one is sometimes tempted into 
going a little too far — especially when one is dragged 
on by a weight of nine hundred thousand francs) — well, 
in that case you could not disavow such a man as Maitre 
Godeschal, who is integrity personified ; but you could 
throw the whole blame on to the shoulders of a paltry 
little law-agent.” 

Mme. de Marville looked with an eye of admiration 
upon Fraisier. 

“You will rise very high, or sink very low,” she said 
to him. “ Were I in your position, instead of looking 
out for this shelf, the office of juge de paix^ I should like 
to be procurator-royal at Mantes ! and go in for a great 
career !” 

“Let me take my own course, madame ! The office 
of juge de paix is a parson’s nag to Monsieur Vitel — to 
me it will be a war-horse.” 

’Twas thus that Mme.'Camusot was induced to make 
to Fraisier this final confidential communication : 

“You seem to me,” said she, “to be so entirely 
devoted to our interests, that I am about to initiate 
you into the difficulties of our position, and into our 
hopes. At the time of the proje'cted match between our 
daughter and a certain adventurer, who has since turned 
banker, the president was extremely anxious to increase 
the Marville estate by purchasing certain pasture-land 
which was then for sale. We parted with this magnifi- 
cent hotel, in order, as you are aware, to secure the 


329 


“ THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.” 

marriage of our daughter ; but, she being an only child, 
it is my anxious wish to acquire what is left of these 
beautiful pasture-lands. They have already been sold 
in part ; they belong to an Englishman, who, after hav- 
ing lived upon the spot for twenty years, is on the point 
of returning to England. He built the most charming 
cottage upon a most delightful site, between the park 
of Marville and the meadows, which formerly belonged 
to the estate ; and in order to form a park, he bought 
up coach-houses, copses and gardens at fabulous prices. 
This dwelling-house, with its appurtenances, forms a 
feature in the landscape, and it lies close to the walls of- 
my daughter’s park. One might buy the house and the 
pastures for seven hundred thousand francs ; for the 
net rental of the meadows is but twenty thousand francs. 
But if Mr. Wadmann hears that we are the purchasers, 
he will be sure to want two or three hundred thousand 
francs more, for he stands to lose that amount if, as is 
usual in the provinces, the residence be thrown in — ” 

“ Why, madame, you may, in my opinion, so fully 
count on the succession being yours, that I am ready to 
play the part of purchaser on your behalf, and I under- 
take to secure the estate for you, on the lowest possible 
terms, by private contract, just as if the transaction 
were effected for a dealer in land. It is in that capacity 
that I shall present myself to the Englishman. I under- 
stand these matters. At Mantes they constituted my 
specialty. The returns of the practice had been doubled 
by Vatinelle, for I must tell you that it was in his name 
that I used to act.” 

“ Hence your acquaintanceship with little Madame 
Vatinelle. That notary must be a wealthy man, by this 
time.” 

“ Yes, but Madame Vatinelle is very extravagant. 


330 ‘‘the tricks of a testator.” 

Well, you may dismiss all anxiety, madame ; I will 
serve you up the Englishman, done to a turn. ’ 

“ If you could bring about that result, you would 
have an eternal claim upon my gratitude. Good-bye, 
dear Monsieur Fraisier, until to-morrow.” 

Fraisier’s parting bow to Mme. de Marville was not 
so servile as it had been on the previous occasion. • 

“So, to-morrow I am going to dine with the President 
de Marville,” said Fraisier to himself. “Come, I have 
these folks in my clutches. Only, in order to be com- 
pletely master of the situation, I ought to be counsel to 
this German, in the person of Tabareau, the bailiff of 
the juge de paix! This Tabareau who will not let me 
marry his daughter — an only daughter — will give her 
to me if I am a juge de paix. Mademoiselle Tabareau, 
that tall red-haired consumptive girl, is the owner, in 
her mother’s right, of a house in the Place Royale ; that 
will qualify me to be a deputy. At her father’s death, 
she will come in for a good six thousand francs a year, 
in addition. She is not handsome, ’tis true ; but good 
God ! when one passes from zero to an income of eight- 
een thousand francs, one must not look too closely at 
the plank that carries one over !” 

And as he threaded his way along the boulevards to 
the Rue de Normandie, Fraisier abandoned himself to 
the current of his golden dream, to the happy prospect 
of being forever beyond the reach of want. He 
thought of bringing about a match between Mile. Vitel, 
the daughter of the juge de paix., and his friend Poulain. 
He saw himself — leagued with his friend the doctor — as 
one of the monarchs of the Quarter ; he would rule the 
elections municipal, military and political. Ah ! how 
short the boulevards seem when, as we trot along them, 


381 


THE TKICKS OP A TESTATOR.” 

our fond ambition, mounted on fancy’s steed, trots at 
our side ! 

When Schmucke returned to the bedside of his 
friend he told Pons that Cibot was dying, and that 
Remonencq had undertaken to fetch Monsieur Trognon, 
the notary. Pons was forcibly impressed by the men- 
tion of this name, the name which Mme. Cibot had so 
often hurled at him in the course of her interminable 
harangues as that of a notary who was the very incar- 
nation of integrity. And now the patient (whose mis- 
givings, since the events of the morning, had become 
unqualified) was struck by a brilliant idea which put 
the finishing touch to liis scheme for deceiving Madame 
Cibot, and completely unmasking her to the credulous 
Schmucke. 

“Schmucke,” said he, taking the hand of the poor 
German, who was dazed by such an accumulation of 
news and events ; “ the house must be in a state of com- 
plete commotion ; if the porter is at the point of death, 
we are pretty well free for some moments — that is to 
say, free from spies ; for spied we are, you may rely 
upon it ! Go out, take a cabriolet, drive to the theatre, 
and tell Mademoiselle Heloise Brisetout, our pi'emiere 
danseuse^ that I want to see her before I die. Tell her 
to come here at half past ten, when her duty is over. 
Go thence to your two friends Schwab and Brunner, 
and beg them to present themselves here at nine o’clock 
in the morning, to inquire after my health — just as if 
they were accidentally passing by — and to come up and 
see me — ” 

Now, the plan formed by the old artist, who felt that 
he was dying, was this : He wanted to make Schmucke 
a rich rnan, by constituting him his universal legatee ; 
and, with a view to shielding Schmucke, as far as possi- 


332 “the tricks of a testator.’’ 

ble, from all trouble and vexation, Pons purposed to 
himself to dictate his will to a notary, in the presence 
of witnesses, so as to exclude the supposition that he 
was not of sound disposing mind, and to deprive the 
Camusots of all pretext for contesting the final disposi- 
tion of his property. This name, Trognon, suggested 
to him that there was some machination on foot; he 
believed in the existence of some scheme for introduc- 
ing into the will some formal defect, of some pre- 
meditated act of treachery on the part of Mme. Cibot ; 
so he resolved' to employ this Trognon to dictate to 
him a holograph will, which he would seal and lock up 
in one of the drawers of his commode. His idea was 
to get Schmucke to secrete himself in one of the closets 
of the alcove, whence he might see Dame Cibot pounc- 
ing on the will, breaking its seal, reading and resealing 
it. Then, at nine o’clock on the following morning, he 
intended to revoke and annul the holograph will, by 
means of a strictly formal and indisputable testament, 
made in the presence of a notary. When Dame Cibot 
treated him as a lunatic and visionary, he read, in this 
her conduct, the vicarious hatred, vengeance and greed 
of Mme. Camusot ; for, stretched on a bed of sickness, 
as the poor man had been for two long months, he had 
beguiled his tedious hours of solitude and sleeplessness 
by sifting, so to speak, the events of his life with the 
riddle of reflection. 

It has been a common practice with sculptors, both 
ancient and modern, to place on either side of the tomb 
a genius holding a kindled torch. These torches, while 
they illumine the path of death, exhibit to the eyes of 
the dying the picture of their sins and errors in its 
proper light. ’Tis a grand idea that sculpture thus 
embodies ; it formulates a phenomenon of human life. 


^^THE TRICKS OF A TESTATOR.^’ 333 

The death-bed has a wisdom of its own. It is a matter 
of common observation that, stretched on that couch, 
artless girls of the most tender age will display the 
sapience of the centenarian, develop the gift of proph- 
ecy, pass judgment on the members of their families, 
and read the hearts of the most accomplished hypocrites. 
This is the poety of Death. 

But — strange it is and well worthy of remark — there 
are two ways of dying. This poetic vaticination, this 
power of looking forward into the future, or backward 
into the past, is strictly confined to invalids whose 
bodily organs only are attacked ; to those who perish 
through the destruction of such portions of the system 
as subserve the material processes of life exclusively. 
Thus, persons attacked by gangrene (as Louis Quatorze 
was), consumptive patients, persons who, like Pons, die 
from fever, or, like Madame de Mortsauf, from infiama- 
tion of the stomach ; those who, like soldiers, are cut 
off by wounds in the full tide of life and health ; all 
these enjoy, to the very last, a sublime lucidity of mind; 
the manner of their deaths fills us with astonishment 
and admiration. Those, on the other hand, who perish 
from diseases that may be termed intellectual, whose 
maladies are seated in the brain, in that nervous 
apparatus which serves to convey the fuel of thought 
from the body to the mind ; these persons die alto- 
gether ; their minds and bodies founder side by side. 
The former (souls unencumbered by substance) bring 
before our very eyes the spectres that we read of in the 
Bible ; the latter are mere corpses. Pons, who had 
never known a woman’s love — Pons, that epicure-Cato, 
that jusc man almost made perfect, now at last saw 
through and through the heart of Mme. Camusot, and 
found it made of cells of gall ; he came to understand 


334 ^^THE TEICKS OF A TESTATOR.’’ 

the world just as he was upon the very point of quit- 
ting it. 

Accordingly, like the light-hearted artist he was, 
finding food for mirth and mockery in all that happens, 
Pons had, during the last few hours, cheerfully selected 
the part he was to play. The last ties that bound him 
to existence — the chains of admiration, the potent fetters 
that linked the connoisseur to the masterpieces of art — 
had been broken on that very morning. When Pons 
found that Dame Cibot had robbed him, he had 
renounced, in a spirit of Christian resignation, the 
pomps and vanities of art, and bidden a long farewell 
to his collection and to his friendships with the creators 
of so many beautiful works. After the fashion of our 
ancestors, who reckoned death among the festivals of 
the Christian, Pons wished to think exclusively of his 
approaching end. In his love for Schmucke, he desired 
to extend his protection to the poor old German, even 
from the grave. It was this fatherly idea that led Pons 
to select the premih'C danseuse of his theatre as an ally 
in his struggle with the traitors by whom he was 
surrounded, traitors who would assuredly show no mercy 
to his universal legatee. 

Heloise Brisetout was endowed with one of those 
natures which remain true, even when placed in a false 
position. She belonged to the school of Jenny Cadine 
and of Josepha, and would have played her tributary 
admirers any trick ; but, as a comrade, she was stanch 
and leal, and she stood in awe of no human power or 
authority whatever ; for the weakness of them, one and 
all, experience had revealed to her, schooled as she had 
been by her encounters with police constables at the 
singularly umwxdX Bal Mabille, and during the Carnival. 

“ If she has thrust her protege, Garangeot, into my 


‘‘the tricks of a testator.” 335 

place, she will, for that very reason, feel all the more 
bound to serve me.” Such was Pons’ unspoken 
reflection. 

Amid the turmoil that reigned in the porter’s lodge it 
was easy for Schmucke to pass out unobserved. He 
returned with the utmost celerity, as he did not like to 
leave Pons long alone. Just as Schmucke came back, 
M. Trognon arrived to make the will ; and, although 
Cibot was in the throes of death, his wife accompanied 
the notary and ushered him into the bed-room. She 
then retired of her own accord, leaving Schmucke, M. 
Trognon and Pons together ; but arming herself with a 
small hand-glass of curious workmanship, she ensconced 
herself near the door, which she left ajar. Thus she 
was so placed»as to be able not only to hear what wa? 
said but to see all that occurred at this extremely critical 
moment. 

“ Monsieur,” said Pons, “ I am in full possession of 
all my faculties — unfortunately for me, for I feel that I 
am dying, and — such, doubtless, is the will of God — not 
one of the pangs of death is spared me ! This is 
Monsieur Schmucke — ” 

The notary bowed to Schmucke. 

“He is the only friend I have on earth,” continued 
Pons, “and I wish to make him my universal legatee. 
Tell me in what form my will should be made, in order 
that my friend (who is a German and entirely ignorant 
of our laws) may inherit my fortune, without being 
exposed to any litigation.” 

“ Everything may be litigated, monsieur,” said the 
notary. “ That is the drawback to all human laws. 
But in the matter of wills, there is one which can not be 
disputed — ” 

“Which is that?” inquired Pons, 


336 “the tricks of a testator.” 

“A will made before a notary, in the presence of 
witnesses who certify that the testator is in full posses- 
sion of all his faculties, the testator having neither wife 
nor children nor father nor brother — ” 

“ I have none of those ties ; all my affections are 
concentrated upon my dear friend Schmucke, here — ” 

Schmucke was weeping. 

“ Well then, since the law allows you, if you have none 
but remote collateral relatives, freely to dispose of your 
estate, subject to the dictates of morality — for you must 
have seen wills impugned on the score of the testator’s 
eccentricity — a will made before a notary is indisputable. 
There^ the identity of the testator cannot be denied, the 
notary has established his sanity, and the signature is 
beyond dispute. A holograph will, ho\^ver, if formal 
and clearly expressed, is tolerably safe.” 

“ For reasons known to myself, I decide in favor of a 
holograph will, to be written by me at your dictation, 
and placed in the custody of my friend here. Can that 
be done ?” 

“ Unquestionably,” said the notary. “ Will you write 
while I dictate ?” 

“ Schmucke,” said Pons, “give me my little buhl ink- 
stand. Dictate in an under-tone, monsieur ; for,” added 
he, “ we may be overheard.” 

“ Tell me, then, in the first place, what are your inten- 
tions,” said the notary. 

After the lapse of ten minutes. Dame Cibot (whom 
Pons was watching in a mirror) saw the testament 
sealed after it had been examined by the notary, while 
Schmucke was lighting a candle. Pons then handed 
the will to Schmucke, telling him to lock it up in a 
secret drawer in Pons’ writing-desk. The testator then 
called for the key of the writing-desk, and tying it in 


^^THE SHAM AVILL.” 337 

the corner of his handkerchief, put the handkerchief 
under his pillow. Thereupon the notary, whom Pons 
had out of politeness appointed executor, and to whom 
he had bequeathed a valuable picture (one of those 
legacies which the law permits a notary to accept), left 
the room and found Mme. Cibot in the saloon. 

“ Well, monsieur ! and has Monsieur Pons remembered 
me?” 

“ Surely, my dear, you don’t expect a notary to betray 
the secrets confided to him,” replied M. Trognon. “All 
that I can tell you is that a good many avaricious folks 
will be disappointed, and a good many expectations 
defeated. Monsieur Pons has made an excellent will, a 
patriotic will, that has my warmest approbation.” 

It is quite impossible to imagine the pitch of curiosity 
at which Mme. Cibot, stimulated by these words, had 
now arrived. She went down to the lodge and spent 
the night at Cibot's bedside ; her intention being to get 
Mile. Remonencq to relieve her between two and three 
o’clock in the morning, when she herself would go 
up-stairs and read the will. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

“the sham will.” 

The visit of Mile. Heloise Brisetout at half past ten 
in the evening seemed to Dame Cibot to be quite in the 
ordinary course of events ; but she was so direly afraid 
of the danseuse mentioning the thousand francs which 
Gaudissard had placed in her maternal hands, that as 


338 ^‘the sham will.” 

she conducted the first lady of the ballet to Pons’ apart- 
ments, she overwhelmed her on the way with attentions 
and flattery meet for a queen. 

“Ah, my dear!” said Heloise, as she mounted the 
stairs, “ I assure you that you are far more attractive on 
your own ground than at the theatre. I do conjure you 
to stick to your vocation.” 

Heloise had driven to the Rue de Normandie under 
the escort of Bixion, her sweetheart, and was most 
magnificently dressed ; for she was on her way to an 
evening party at the house of Mariette, one of the most 
illustrious premtlres da?iseuses of the opera. Indeed, M. 
Chapoulot, a retired lace manufacturer of the Rue St. 
Denis (who occupied the first floor, and was just return- 
ing with his daughter from the Ambigu Comique) and 
Mme. Chapoulot were alike amazed at beholding so 
gorgeous and beautiful a creature upon their staircase. 

“ Who is she, Madame Cibot ?” inquired Mme. Cha- 
poulot. 

“Oh, a good-for-nothing creature! a mere jumper, 
that folks may see, half naked, any evening for forty 
sous,” replied the portress, in a whisper. 

“Victorine, my darling,” said Mme. Chapoulot to her 
daughter, “ make room for the lady to pass.” 

This cry of maternal alarm did not escape the ear of 
Heloise. She turned round and said to the lady : 

“Your daughter, madame, must surely be worse than 
tinder, since you are afraid she may catch fire by merely 
touching me.” 

Heloise looked pleasantly at M. Chapoulot and smiled^ 

“Well, I must say that she is very pretty off the 
stage,” said that gentleman, who showed no inclination 
to quit the landing ; but Mme. Chapoulot pinched her 


339 


“the sham will.” 

husband hard enough to make him cry out, and pushed 
him into their apartments. 

“Here is a second floor which has usurped the 
appearance of being a fourth floor,” said Heloise. 

“Ah, but then mademoiselle is accustomed to rising,” 
said Dame Cibot, as she opened the door of Pons’ 
rooms. 

“Well, old fellow,’ said Heloise, as she entered the 
bedroom, and saw the poor musician lying stretched out 
at full length, pale, and with shrunken features, “you're 
not so well as you should be, then } Everybody at 
the theatre is anxious about you ; but you know what 
life is ! However good-hearted one may be, every one 
has business of some sort to attend to, and one cannot 
And a spare hour for looking up one’s friends. Gaudis- 
sard talks about coming here every day, and then, morn- 
ing after morning, he is driven to his wits’ end by his 
managerial duties. Nevertheless, we are all fond of 
you.” 

“ Madame Cibot,” said the sufferer, “ do me the favor 
to leave mademoiselle and us alone together ; we have 
to talk about theatrical matters and about my post of 
conductor — Schmucke will be good enough to see 
madame to her carriage.” 

At a sign from Pons, Schmucke led Mme. Cibot to 
the door and bolted it behind her, 

“ Ah ! the scoundrel of a German ; Ae too is getting 
spoiled,” quoth Dame Cibot to herself, when she heard 
the significant sound of the drawn bolts, “ It’s Monsieur 
Pons what sets him on to do these horrid things. But 
you shall pay me for it, my little friends,” said she to 
herself as she descended the stairs “Bah! if this 
mountebank of a dancer mentions the thousand francs. 
I’ll tell the old boys it’s nothing but an actor’s joke.” 


340 


“the sham will.’’ 

And so saying, she resumed her seat near the pillow 
of poor Cibot, who was complaining that his stomach 
was on fire ; for Remonencq had just been giving him 
a draught during his wife’s absence. 

“My dear child,” said Pons to the danseuse, while 
Schmucke was engaged in dismissing Dame Cibot, “ I 
trust entirely to you to choose me an honest notary, who 
will come here at half past nine to-morrow morning to 
receive my will. I want to leave my whole fortune to 
my friend Schmucke. Should he be tormented by any 
one, ’tis on this notary that I reckon to advise and to 
defend him. That is why I desire to have a notary of 
high reputation and great wealth — one who is altogether 
above the temptations which sometimes seduce the legal 
practitioner from the right path ; for in this notary, my 
poor legatee must find a prop to lean upon. I distrust 
Berthier, Cardot’s successor, and you who know so many 
people — ” 

“Ah, I have it!” said the danseuse. “The man you 
want is Leopold Hannequin, notary to Florine and the 
Comtesse de Bruel — a virtuous man who doesn't know 
what a lorette is. He’s a sort of second-hand father, a 
worthy man who saves one from playing Old Harry with 
the money one gets. I call him the father of the rats, 
for he has imbued all my friends with principles of 
economy. To begin with, he has an income of sixty 
thousand francs independently of his profession, my dear 
fellow. Then, he is a notary of the old school. He is a 
notary when he walks and when he sleeps ; all his chil- 
dren must needs be little notaries and notaresses born. 
In short, he’s a dull, heavy, pedantic man ; but — he"s a 
man whom no earthly power can bend when he is in the 
exercise of his functions. He never kept a mistress ; he 
is a fossil paterfamilias, and his wife worships him and 


341 


“the sham will/’ 

is true to him, although she is a notary’s wife. What 
can you have more? There’s nothing better to be had 
in Paris — in the way of notaries. He is patriarchal, ’tis 
true ; he’s not at all absurd and amusing, as Cardot 
used to be with Malaga ; but then he will never give his 
creditors the slip like that little thing-a-bob who lived 
with Antonia. I will send him here to-morrow morning 
at eight o’clock, so you may sleep in peace In the first 
place, I hope you’ll get well, and write some more pretty 
music for us ; but, after all, life’s a sad business in these 
days when contractors haggle and kings play for pence 
and ministers pilfer and rich folks go in for cheese-par- 
ing. Artists too have none of this left,’' said she, clap- 
ping her hand to her heart ; “ it is high time to die — 
good-bye, old man !” 

“ Above and beyond all, Heloise, I beg you to main- 
tain the strictest secrecy.” 

“ This isn’t a matter that relates to the theatre ! ’Tis 
a thing that is sacred to an artist,” said she. 

“ Who is your present protector, child ?” asked Pons. 

“ The mayor of your arrondissement. Monsieur Bau- 
doyer, who is every whit as stupid as Crevel deceased ; 
for I suppose you are aware that Crevel, one of Gau- 
dissard’s former partners, died a few days since, and 
hasn’t left me a fraction — no, not even so much as a pot 
of pomatum ! That’s what causes me to say that the 
times we live in are disgusting.” 

And what did he die of ?” 

Of his wife — ! If he had stuck to me, he would have 
been alive now. Good-bye, my dear old fellow ! I talk 
to you about kicking the bucket, because I can see that, 
in a fortnight’s lime we shall have you trotting along 
the boulevards, and smelling out your pretty little curi- 


342 ‘‘the sham will.” 

osities once more ; for you're not ill, your eyes are 
brighter now than I ever knew them.” 

And off went the premilre danseuse, fully convinced that 
her protege, ‘Garangeot, was permanently installed in 
the post of leader of the orchestra. Garangeot was her 
cousin-german. 

Every door was ajar, and every family was on the 
alert as the premilre danseuse went down-stairs. Her visit 
was quite an event in that house. 

Like a bull-dog which never lets go a bit of meat into 
which he has once set his teeth, Fraisier was stationed 
in the lodge, cheek by jowl with Mme, Cibot, when the 
ballet-dancer passed under the entrance gate-way and 
called for the door to be opened. He knew that the will 
had been made ; he had just been gauging Dame Cibot’s 
mental condition ; for Maitre Trognon, the notary, had 
been as reticent about the will to Fraisier as he had 
been to Mme. Cibot. It was quite natural that the man 
of law should observe the danseuse as she passed out ; 
and he secretly resolved to turn to good account this 
visit in extremis. 

“ My dear Madame Cibot,” said Fraisier ; “ this is for 
you the critical moment.” 

Ah, yes/’ said she, my poor dear Cibot 1 To think 
that he’ll not live to enjoy whatever I may come in for !” 

The thing is to find out whether Monsieur Pons has 
left you anything; whether, in fact, your name is men- 
tioned in the will or whether you have been forgotten,” 
continued Fraisier. “I represent the natural heirs of 
the testator, and, in any case, it is only through them 
that you will get a single farthing ; for the will is a holo- 
graph, and is, consequently, anything but indisputable. 
Do you happen to know where our patient has put it ?” 

“ Yes ; in a secret drawer of his writing-desk, and he’s 


343 


“ THE SHAM WILL.” 

taken the key of it, and he’s tied it up in the corner of 
his handkerchief, and he’s been" and stuck the handker- 
chief under his pillow. I saw the whole thing.” 

“ Is the will sealed up ?” 

“ Alas, yes.” 

“ To obtain possession of a will surreptitiously and to 
suppress it is a crime ; but to take a peep at it is only a 
delict ; and in any case what does it amount to ? a pec- 
cadillo which no one can swear to ! Is our friend a heavy 
sleeper ?” 

“ He is ; but when you wanted to have a good look at 
his collection and value the lot, he must have been sleep- 
ing as sound as a top, and yet he awoke. Howsomever, 
I’ll see what can be done. This morning I’ll go n’up to 
relieve Monsieur Schmucke at four o’clock, and if you’ll 
come you can have ten minutes to look at the will — ” 

“ Well, that’s settled, then ; I will get up at four o’clock, 
and I’ll knock gently — 

" Mademoiselle Remonencq, who’ll take my place near 
Cibot, will know who it is, and will pull the door-string ; 
but rap at the window so as not to wake any one.” 

“ Agreed,” said Fraisier ; you will have a light, won’t 
you ? a candle will be quite enongh.” 

At midnight the poor old German, seated in an arm- 
chair and almost broken-hearted, was watching Pons, 
whose features, contracted like those of a dying man, 
wore an expression of exhaustion so intense that he 
seemed to be on the very verge of dissolution. 

“ I think that I have just sufficient strength to last till 
to-morrow evening,” said the sufferer, philosophically. 
“My death-struggle will come, my dear Schmucke, to- 
morrow night, no doubt. So soon as the notary and your 
two friends have left me, you will go and fetch our good 
Abbe Duplanty, the curate of Saint Francis. The worthy 


344 “ THE SHAM WILL.” 

man does not know that I am ill ; and I should like to 
receive the holy sacraments to-morrow at midday.” 

After a long pause Pons resumed ; “ God has not seen fit 
that my life should be what I had dreamed it might be. 
I should have been so fond of my wife, my children, my 
family — if I had had them ! To be loved and cherished 
by a few beings, in some quiet nook — that was my sole 
ambition ! Life is bitter to every one ; for I have seen 
people blessed with all that I have vainly longed for, and 
yet not happy. Toward the close of my career, the good 
God bestowed upon me the unexpected consolation of 
meeting with such a friend as you ; and indeed, my dear 
Schmucke, I cannot reproach myself with having mis- 
understood or undervalued you ; I have given you my 
heart and all the affection that was at my command. 
No, Schmucke, do not weep, or I must hold my tongue ; 
and it is so sweet to me to talk to you about ourselves. 
Had I attended to what you said to me, I should have 
lived ; I should have quitted the world and my old 
habits of life, and should have escaped the mortal 
wounds I have received. Now, I wish to think of you 
exclusively — ” 

“ You are wrong — ” 

“Do not gainsay me, but listen to me, dear friend. 
You are as simple and as candid as a child of six years 
old that has never left its mother’s side — ’tis a frame of 
mind that is worthy of all respect ; it seems to me that 
God Himself should take charge of beings such as you 
are. But still men are so wicked that it is my duty to 
put you on your guard against them. You are, there- 
fore, on the point of losing your noble trustfulness, your 
sacred unsuspectingness — that ornament of the pure in 
heart which is given only to genius, and to beings like 
yourself. You are shortly about to see Madame Cibot 


THE SHAM WILL.” 845 

(who was watching us closely through the half-open 
door) come and take this pretended will. I presume that 
the wretch will undertake this expedition this morning 
when she thinks you are asleep. Now, mark well what 
I say, and follow my instructions to the very letter. Do 
you hear me ?” asked the sick man. 

Overwhelmed with grief and seized with a fearful 
palpitation of the heart, Schmucke had allowed his head 
to sink upon the back of his arm-chair, and seemed to 
have fainted. 

“ Yez,” said the German, bowed down beneath the 
weight of his sorrow ; “ yez, I hear what you say. But 
it is az if you were two hundred yards away from me — 
it zeems az if I were going wid you into de grave.” 

He drew near to Pons, and taking his hand and clasp- 
ing it between his own hands, breathed to himself a 
fervent prayer. 

“What are you muttering there in German ?” 

“ I was braying to God to take us to Himself togeder,” 
replied Schmucke,'simply, when his prayer was ended. 

With great difficulty (for he was suffering fearful 
pains in the liver) Pons managed to stoop low enough 
to imprint a kiss upon Schmucke’s forehead. In that 
kiss Pons poured forth his whole soul in a blessing upon 
that being who in heart and mind resembled the Lamb 
that reposes at the feet of God. 

“Now, listen to me, my good Schmucke ; dying men 
must be obeyed — ” 

“ I am liztening.” 

“ The communication between your rooms and mine 
is through a little door in your alcove, opening into one 
of the closets of my alcove.” 

“Yez, but de clozet is grammed with bictures.” 


346 “ THE SHAM WILL.’’ 

“ Go and clear the door at once, and make as little 
noise as possible.” 

“Yes,” said Schmucke. 

“ Clear the passage at each end^ both your end and 
mine ; then leave your door ajar. When Dame Cibot 
comes to relieve guard at my bedside — s.he may very 
likely come an hour earlier than usual this morning — go 
away to bed as usual, and seem to be very tired. Try 
to look sleepy. As soon as she has settled herself in 
her arm-chair, go through your little door and remain 
on watch there ; raise the small muslin curtain of this 
glass door, and narrowly observe what takes place. Do 
you understand ?” 

“Yez, I know what you mean ; you believe dat de 
wicked woman will purn de will — ” 

“ I don’t know what she will do with it, but I am sure 
that henceforth you won’t take her for an angel. Now 
play me some music, delight me with one of your 
improvisations ; ’twill give you something to do, you 
will get rid of your gloomy ^ideas, and will fill the void 
of this sad night with one of your poems — ” 

Schmucke took his seat at the piano. He was now in 
his element, and the musical inspiration arising from 
the tremor of his grief, aided by the excitement result- 
ing from that grief, soon bore the worthy German 
beyond the bounds of this material world. The themes 
that he invented were sublime, and he adorned them 
with capricctos, executed, now with all the sweetness 
and Raphaelesque perfection of Chopin, now with all 
the fire and Dantesque majesty of Liszt, the two 
performers whose musical organization most closely 
resembles that of Paganini. When execution arrives at 
this degree of faultlessness the performer seems to be 
placed upon a level wdth the poet ; he is to the composer 


347 


“ THE SHAM WILL.” 

what the actor is to the author — a divine translator of a 
divine work. But on this particular night, during which 
Schmucke gave Pons a foretaste of the concerts of 
Paradise — of that exquisite music which steals the 
instruments from the grasp of Saint Cecilia and strews 
them on the jasper floor of heaven, the old German was 
both Beethoven and Paganini — the creator and the 
interpreter both in one. Inexhaustible as the nightin- 
gale, sublime as the heaven beneath which it sings, vari- 
ous and leafy as the forest which it fills with its magic 
melodies, Schmucke surpassed himself and plunged the 
old musician, who was listening to him, into the ecstasy 
which Raphael has depicted in that painting which is 
one of the sights of Bologna. But this musical poem 
was interrupted by a frightful ringing of bells. The 
house-maid of the first-floor lodgers came up to entreat 
Schmucke to put a stop to that witches’ Sabbath. Mme., 
M. and Mile. Chapoulot were all awake and could not 
get to sleep again ; and they begged to say that the day 
was quite long enough for the rehearsal of theatrical 
music, and that in a house situated in the Marais it was 
not proper to strum upon the piano at night. As a 
matter of fact, it was about three o’clock in the morn- 
ing. 

At half past three the previsions of Pons — who might 
well have been supposed to have overheard the con- 
ference between Fraisier and Dame Cibot — were realized 
by the entrance of the portress. The j)atient directed 
at Schmucke a glance of intelligence which meant : 

Did I not guess correctly ?” and forthwith assumed 
the position of one who is buried in the profoundest 
slumber. 

So firm was Dame Cibot’s belief in the simplicity of 
Schmucke (and here by the way we may note that this 


348 


^^THE SHAM WILL.” 

artlessness is one of the greatest resources, and the cause 
of the success of the plots of children) that that 
estimable creature could not possibly suspect his good 
faith, when he approached her, and said, with an air in 
which sorrow was blended with elation : 

“He has had a terrible night ; he has been tevilishly 
egzited. I was opliged to blay in order to galm him, 
and de lotchers on de first floor zent up to dell me to 
be guiet. It is frightful ; for de life of my friend was 
at stake. I am zo dired from having blayed all night 
long dat I am dead beat dis morning.” 

“My poor Cibot, too, is very bad ; another such day 
as yesterday and there will be no hopes of him. But 
what can one do ? God’s will be done !” 

“You are sudge.an honest greature, and have sudge 
a goot heart, dat if Fader Zibod dies I will dague you 
to liff with me,” said the artful Schmucke. 

When the artless and upright begin to dissemble 
they are truly formidable — as formidable as children 
whose snares are laid with all the skill which savages 
display. 

“Well, get you to bed, now, my little man,” said 
Dame Cibot. “ Your n’eyes are that weary that they 
are as big as my fist. Ah ! there is but one thing as 
could console me for the loss of Cibot, and that would 
be the thought that I should n’end my days with a 
worthy man like you. Don’t you put yourself about. 
I’ll lead that Madame Chapoulot a pretty dance. Is 
it for a retired milliner to give herself such airs and 
graces ?” 

Thereupon Schmucke went and took up the post of 
observation which he had prepared for himself. Dame 
Cibot had left the door ajar, and Fraisier glided in and 
gently closed it so soon as Schmugke had shut himself 


THE SHAM WILL. 


349 


a 




in his own room. The advocate was provided with a 
candle and a piece of very fine brass wire, wherewith 
to unseal the will. Dame Cibot experienced very 
little difficulty in removing the key that was tied in 
the handkerchief which lay beneath Pons’ pillow ; 
inasmuch as the old musician had designedly allowed 
the handkerchief to peep from beneath the bolster, and 
aided Dame Cibot’s manoeuvres by lying with his head 
over the edge of the bedstead and in a position that 
rendered it a very simple matter to capture the hand- 
kerchief. Having secured the key, Dame Cibot 
marched straight to the writing-desk, opened it as 
noiselessly as possible, discovered the spring of the 
secret drawer, and rushed into the saloon with the will 
in her hand. This circumstance excited Pons’ curiosity 
to the very highest degree. As for Schmucke, he trem- 
bled from head to foot as if he had been committing 
some crime. 

“Go back to your post,’’ said Fraisier, as he took the 
will from Dame Cibot; “for if he should wake he 
ought to find you there.’’ 

When Fraisier (with an adroitness which showed 
that this was not his maiden effort of this kind) had 
unsealed the envelope, he read, with profound astonish- 
ment, the following singular document : 


“This is my will. 

“This fifteenth day of April, one thousand eight hun- 
dred and forty-five, being of sound mind, as this testa- 
ment drawn up with the assistance of Monsieur 
Trognon, notary, will prove, I, feeling that I must 
shortly succumb to the illness from which I have been 
suffering since the commencement of the month of 
February last, have thought fit, inasmuch as I desire to 


350 


THE SHAM WILL.” 

dispose of my goods and chattels, to make my last will 
as follows. I have frequently been struck by the evils 
to which the masterpieces of the painter are exposed — 
evils which frequently involve the total destruction of 
those masterpieces. I have been seized with a feeling 
of pity for the beautiful pictures which are doomed to 
travel perpetually from clime to clime without ever 
finding a home in one certain spot, to which those who 
admire them may repair to view them. It has always 
been my opinion that the really immortal pages of the 
great masters ought to be national property, and should 
be continually offered to the eyes of men, just as light 
(which is God’s masterpiece) is granted to all His chil- 
dren. 

“ Now, inasmuch as I have spent my life in choosing 
^nd gathering together sundry pictures, which are the 
glorious productions of the greatest masters ; since 
these pictures are perfect, and have never been either 
repainted or retouched, I have dwelt with pain upon 
the thought, that, after having been the delight of my 
existence, they are doomed to be sold by auction, and 
to be scattered, some in England, some in Russia — dis- 
persed hither and thither, as they were before they 
were brought together by me. I have, therefore, deter- 
mined to save them from these misfortunes, them and 
the magnificent frames in which they are inclosed, and 
which are all of them the handiwoik of cunning work- 
men. 

“Actuated, therefore, by these motives, I give and 
bequeath to the king the pictures comprised in my col- 
lection as a contribution to the museum at the Louvre, 
charged — if the bequest be accepted — with the pay- 
ment of an annuity of two thousand four hundred 
francs to my friend Monsieur Schmucke. If the king 


(C 


THE SHAM WILL.^^ _351 

as trustee of the museum, disclaims the legacy bur- 
dened with this charge, then the said pictures shall 
form part of the bequest which I hereby make to my 
friend Schmucke, of all the property of which I am 
possessed on condition that he shall make over the 
‘ Monkey’s Head ’ by Goya, to my cousin, President 
Camusot, and the flower picture by Abraham Mignon, 
being a study of tulips, to Monsieur Trognon, notary, 
whom I hereby appoint executor of this my testament, 
and upon further condition, that he pays to Madame 
Cibot, who has been my housekeeper for ten years, an 
annuity of two hundred francs. Lastly, my friend 
Schmucke will make over the ‘ Descent from the Cross,' 
by Rubens, being the sketch of his celebrated picture 
at Antwerp, to my parish church for the ornamentation 
of one of its chapels, as a token of gratitude for the 
kindness of Monsieur Duplanty the curate, to whom I 
am beholden for the power of dying a Christian and a 
Catholic,” etc., etc. 

“ ’Tis absolute ruin !” exclaimed Fraisier to himself ; 
“ the ruin of all my hopes. Ah ! I begin to believe all 
that Madame Camusot told me about the malignity of 
this old artist !” 

“Well?” said Dame Cibot, coming in. 

“Your gentleman is a monster; he has given every- 
thing to the museum, to the State ! The will cannot be 
set aside. We are robbed, ruined, plundered !” 

“What has he given meV 

“An annuity of two hundred francs.” 

“ That's a fine tale. Why, he’s no end of a scamp !” 

“Go and see if there’s an end of him,” said Fraisier. 
“ I am about to replace the will of your scamp in its 
envelope,” 


852 “dame sattvage reappears.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

“ WHEREIN DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 

The moment that Mme. Cibot’s back was turned, 
Fraisier clapped the will into his pocket and supplied 
its place in the envelope with a sheet of blank paper. 
He then resealed the envelope so skilfully that he tri- 
umphantly exhibited the seal to Mme. Cibot on her 
return, and asked her whether she could detect the 
slightest trace of the operation. Dame Cibot took the 
envelope, fingered it, and feeling that it was full, heaved 
a profound sigh. She had fondly hoped that Fraisier 
would himself have burned the fatal document. 

“ Well, and what is to be done now, my dear Monsieur 
Fraisier?” she inquired. 

“ Oh ! that is your concern ! I am not the heir ; but 
if I had the least claim to all that,” continued he, point- 
ing to the collection, “ I know full well what 1 should 
do.” 

“ That's precisely what I’m a-asking of you,” said 
Dame Cibot, stupidly. 

“ There’’s a fire in the grate,” said Fraisier, as he rose 
to depart. 

“Well, when all’s said and done, no one but you and 
me’ll know anything about the matter !” said Dame 
Cibot. 

“ It can never be proved that there was any will in 
existence,” replied the man of law. 

“And how about you ?” 



SCHMUCKE POINTED TO THE , WHITE, WAN, SHARPENED FEATURES — Page 370 , 


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“ DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 353 

^‘Me ? — if Monsieur Pons dies, intestate, I guarantee 
you a hundred thousand francs.” 

“Ah, yes, of course,” said she ; “ people promise you 
heaps of gold, and when they've got what they want 
they haggle with you just as — ” 

She stopped short, and it was high time, for she wa^ 
just on the point of mentioning Elie Magus to Fraisier« 

“Well, I’m off,” said Fraisier. “In your interests it 
won’t do for me to be seen in these rooms ; but we will 
meet below in the lodge.” 

When she had closed the outer door. Dame Cibot 
returned with the envelope in her hand, fully intending 
to throw it into the fire, but when she had reached the 
bedroom and was making for the fire-place, she felt 
both her arms suddenly pinioned, and found herself 
with Pons on one side of her and Schmucke on the 
other. The friends had planted themselves on either 
side of the door, with their backs against the partition. 

“ Oh !” screamed Dame Cibot, and fell upon the floor 
in hideous convulsions — real or feigned ; the truth was 
never known. 

This spectacle produced so strong an impression upon 
Pons, that he was seized with a mortal faintness ; and 
Schmucke, leaving Dame Cibot where she lay, made 
haste to get Pons into bed again. The two friends 
trembled like men who in the execution of some pain- 
ful project have overtaxed their strength. When Pons 
was in bed and Schmucke had partially regained his 
equanimity, his attention was attracted by the sound of 
some sobbing ; ani ' Dame Cibot, on her knees, was 
weeping bitter’y ana stretching out her hands to the 
two friends, was addressing entreaties to them in most 
expressive dumb sL 

“It’s only idle ci ity ! dear Monsieur Pons,” said 


354 


^^DAME SAUVAGE KEAPPEARS.'’ 


she, SO soon as she saw that the attention of the two 
friends was directed toward her ; “ the besetting sin of 
women, you know ! But I found I couldn’t read your 
will, and I was a-going to replace it — ” 

“Away* wid you!’’ said Schmucke, starting to his 
feet, and towering with his towering indignation, “you 
are ein monzder ! you have tried to gill my goot Bons. 
He is right ! you are worze dan a monzder ; you are 
accurzed !’’ 

When Dame Cibot perceived the horror depicted on 
the face of the candid German, she rose from her knees, 
proud as Tartuffe, darted at Schmucke a glance that 
made him tremble, and left the room, taking with her, 
concealed in the folds of her dress, a beautiful little pic- 
ture by Metzu, which Elie Magus had greatly admired, 
terming it “a diamond.” In the lodge Dame Cibot 
found Fraisier, who was waiting for her in the hope that 
she would have burned the envelope and the blank sheet 
of paper which he had substituted for the will. Great 
was his astonishment to see his client terror-stricken, 
and, to all appearances, entirely upset. 

“ What has happened ?” said he. 

“What has happened, dear Monsieur Fraisiec? Why 
just this has happened ; that under pretense of giving 
me sound advice, and acting as my guide, you have 
caused me to lose all chance of getting my n’annuity 
and the confidence of these gentlemen — ” 

And she launched forth upon one of those torrents of 
words in which she was unrivaled. 

“ Don’t waste your breath in talking nonsense,” said 
Fraisier, dryly, cutting his client short. “ The facts ! 
the facts ! and quickly.” 

“Well then, this was what happened.” And she told 
him exactly what had occurred. 


“ DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 


355 


“I haven’t caused you to lose anything,” replied 
Fraisier. “These two gentlemen must have had some 
doubts about your honesty ; else they would not have 
laid This trap for you ; they were waiting for and 
watching you ! You are keeping something back from 
me,” added the man of law, casting a tiger glance at the 
portress. 

“ J/e keep anything back from you ! After all as you 
and me have done together !” 

“ But, my darling, / have done nothing that is repre- 
hensible,” said Fraisier, thus manifesting his intention 
to deny his nocturnal visit to Pons’ rooms. 

Dame Cibot felt as if the roots of her hair were so 
many red-hot wires while the rest of her body was as 
cold as ice. 

“What?” exclaimed she, dumbfounded. 

“ Here is the criminal process, ready to hand ! You 
have rendered yourself liable to be prosecuted for 
stealing a will,” replied Fraisier, coolly. 

Dame Cibot met this assertion with a gesture of horror. 

“Take courage,” pursued Fraisier ; “you have me for 
your counsel. My only object was to show you how 
easy it is, in one way or another, to expose yourself to 
what I told you of in our first interview. Come now, 
what have you done to this German, who is so unsus- 
pecting, to lead him to secrete himself in the room 
without your knowledge ?” 

“ Nothing at all. It all comes of what happened the 
other day when I kept on telling Monsieur Pons that he 
had seen double. Ever since that day these gentlemen 
have changed their manner to me n’altogether ; so that 
you are the cause of all my misfortunes ; for if I had 
lost my hold upon Monsieur Pons, I was, at least, sure 
of the German, for he talked about marrying me, or of 


356 


DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 

taking me to live with him, which it's all one and 
the same thing.” 

This explanation was so plausible that Fraisier was 
obliged to rest contented with it. 

“Cheer up,” he resumed; “I have promised you a 
fortune and I will keep my word. Up to this moment, 
everything connected with this affair was problematical ; 
now it is as good as bank-notes ; you will have an annuity 
of twelve hundred francs, at least. But you must obey 
my orders, my dear Madame Cibot, and execute them 
with intelligence.” 

“I will, dear Monsieur Fraisier,” said the portress, 
with all the suppleness of servility. She was completely 
cowed. 

“Well! good-bye then,” said Fraisier, quitting the 
lodge, and carrying off the dangerous will in his pocket. 

He returned home in great exultation, for the will 
was a most formidable weapon in his hands. 

“ I shall now have an excellent guarantee for the good 
faith of Madame de Marville,” thought he. “ If she 
should take it into her head to break her promise, she 
would lose the succession.” 

At early dawn, Remonencq, having opened his shop 
and left it to the care of his sister, went, as he had been 
in the habit of doing for some days past, to see how his 
good friend Cibot was faring. He found the portress 
examining the picture by Metzu. She was asking herself 
how a little bit of painted wood could possibly be worth 
so much money. 

“Ah! ah!” said Remonencq, looking over Madame 
Cibot’s shoulder, “ that’s the only picture which Monsieur 
Magus was sorry at not having; he said that if he 
owned that little thing, nothing would be wanting to 
complete his happiness,” 


357 


“ DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 

“What would he give for it?” asked Dame Cibot. 

“ Now, if you promise to marry me within a year 
of your widowhood,” replied Remonencq, “ I will 
undertake to get twenty thousand francs for it from 
Elie Magus, and, if you don’t marry me, you will never 
be able to sell the picture for more than a thousand 
francs.” 

“And why?” 

“ Because you would be obliged to give a receipt as 
the owner of the picture, and that would involve you 
in a lawsuit with the heirs. If you were my wife, / 
should sell it myself to Monsieur Magus, and all that is 
required of a dealer is an entry in his purchase-book, 
and I shall enter the picture as sold to me by Monsieur 
Schmucke. Come now, let me put the bit of wood in 
my shop — if your husband should die, you might get 
into trouble about it, whereas no one would think it 
odd for me to have a picture in my place. You know 
me well enough to trust me ; besides, if you wish it, I 
will give you a receipt.” 

Caught as she was, in this act of criminality, the 
avaricious portress closed with Remonencq’s offer, and 
thus forever bound herself to him. 

“ You are quite right,” said she, locking up the 
picture in her chest of drawers. “ Bring me your 
receipt.” 

“ Neighbor,” said the broker, in an under-tone, lead- 
ing the portress to the step of the gate-way, “ I can 
plainly see that we shall not save the life of our poor 
friend Cibot ; Dr Poulain gave no hopes of him yester- 
day evening, and said that he would not last out the 
day. It’s very sad, no doubt ; but after all you were 
not in your proper place here. Your place is in a fine 
shop in the Boulevard des Capucines. Are you aware 


35S ‘‘dame sauvage keappeaks.” 

that I have made nearly a hundred thousand francs in 
the last ten years, and if you have an equal amount one 
of these days, I undertake to make a fine fortune for 
you — if you are my wife. You would be a lady, well 
waited on by my sister, who would look after the house- 
keeping, and — ” 

Here the broker was interrupted by the heart-rending 
groans of the little tailor, who was just beginning to 
feel the agonies of death. 

“ Go along with you,” said Dame Cibot ; “ you 

n’are a monster, to talk to me about such things, 
while my poor husband is dying in such dreadful 
pain — ” 

“Ah, it’s because I love you to distraction, and would 
do anything to get you,” said Remonencq. 

“If you loved me, you wouldn’t say anything to me 
just now,” replied she. 

And Remonencq returned to his shop, sure that Dame 
Cibot would be his wife. 

At about ten o’clock there was a sort of tumult at the 
door of the house ; for the sacraments were being 
administered to Cibot. All the friends of the little 
tailor, the porters and portresses of the Rue de Nor- 
mandie and of the adjacent streets, encumbered the 
lodge, the entrance gate-way and the street front of 
the house. Under these circumstances the successive 
arrivals of M. Leopold Hannequin, accompanied by one 
of his brother notaries, and of Schwab and Brunner, 
attracted no attention. They reached Pons’ apartments 
unobserved by Mme. Cibot ; for it was to the portress 
of the adjoining house that the notary applied for infor- 
mation as to which story Pons occupied, she it was who 
directed him to the second floor. As to Schwab’s 
companion, Brunner, he had already paid a visit 


^ DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 


859 


to the Pons Museum ; he therefore passed on without 
making any inquiries, and showed the way to his part- 
ner Schwab. 

Pons now formally revoked the will which he had 
made on the previous evening, and appointed Schmucke 
his universal legatee. As soon as the ceremony was 
over and Pons had expressed his gratitude to Schwab 
and Brunner, and earnestly commended the interests of 
Schmucke to Monsieur Leopold Hannequin, the old 
musician sunk into a state of utter prostration — the 
result of the energy he had exerted during the night- 
scene with Dame Cibot, and in this the final act of the 
drama of social life. So intense was his exhaustion 
that Schmucke begged Schwab to go and inform the 
Abbe Duplanty ; for the old German did not like to 
quit the bedside of his dying friend, and Pons was 
asking that the sacraments might be administered to 
him. 

Dame Cibot, meanwhile, who had been excluded 
from the apartments of the two friends, was seated at 
the foot of her husband’s bed, and had wholly neglected 
to prepare Schmucke’s breakfast. But the events of 
the morning, and the spectacle of Pons’ calm dissolu- 
tion — for the old musician was facing death like a 
hero — had so wrung the heart of Schmucke that he 
felt no sensation of hunger. Toward two o’clock, 
how'ever, the portress, having seen nothing of the old 
German, was induced by curiosity quite as much as by 
concern on Schmucke’s account to ask Remonencq’s 
sister to go and see whether the old German wanted 
anything. Just at that very moment the Abbe Duplanty 
(having heard the poor musician’s last confession) was 
administering to him the rite of extreme unction ; so 
that the ceremony was disturbed by Mile. Remonencq’s 


360 


DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.’’ 

repeated ringing. Now, seeing that Pons, in his dread 
of being robbed, had prevailed upon Schmucke to 
swear that he would allow no one to enter the apart- 
ments, the old German took no heed of Mile. Remon- 
encq’s reiterated applications to the bell-handle ; where- 
upon that lady went down-stairs in great alarm, and 
told Dame Cibot that Schmucke had not opened the 
door to her. 

This circumstance (which was sufficiently striking) did 
not escape the observation of Fraisier, who, ever since 
breakfast-time had been stationed in the porter’s lodge, 
where he had held an unbroken conference with his 
friend. Dr. Poulain. Schmucke — so thought the man of 
law — Schmucke (to whom a death-bed was a novelty) 
was on the point of being subjected to all the incon- 
veniences which surround the denizen of Paris who is 
suddenly brought face to face with death — inconve- 
niences which are greatly enhanced by the want of aid 
and the absence of an agent. It was at this crisis, then, 
that the idea of being himself the mainspring of all 
Schmucke’s movements occurred to Fraisier, who knew 
full well that, under such circumstances, relatives who 
are genuinely distressed lose their heads entirely. We 
will now relate how the two friends, Dr. Poulain and 
Fraisier, set to work to achieve the desired result. 

The beadle of Saint Francis’, one Cantinet by name, 
who had formerly been a dealer in glass, lived in the 
Rue d’Orleans, in the house adjoining that in which Dr. 
Poulain’s apartments were situated. Now, it so hap- 
pened that Mme. Cantinet, one of the pew openers at 
Saint Francis’, had been attended by Dr. Poulain 
gratuitously. She consequently felt very much indebted 
to him, and had often imparted to him the whole story 
of her misfortunes. The Pair of Nut-Crackers who, on 


361 


“dame sauvage reappears.” 

Sundays and saints’ days regularly attended the services 
at Saint Francis’, were on excellent terms with the 
beadle, the Swiss, the dispenser of holy water ; in short, 
with all the members of that ecclesiastical militia which, 
in Paris, is dubbed with the title of le bas clerge — a class 
of persons to whom the faithful are in the habit of pre- 
senting small gratuities when years have ripened the 
acquaintanceship. Schmucke, accordingly, was as well 
known to Mme. Cantinet as Mme. Cantinet was to him. 
Now, in Mme. Cantinet’s side’ there were two thorns, 
which enabled Fraisier to use her as a blind and passive 
tool. Cantinet junior was stage-struck ; turning his 
back upon the ranks of the Church Militant and the 
beadle-hood that was probably in store for him, he had 
enrolled himself among the ballet-dancers at the Cirque- 
Olympique, and was leading a devil-may-care existence 
that well-nigh broke his mother’s heart. Her purse, too, 
had often been emptied by his forced loans. Cantinet, 
senior, her husband, was the slave of two vices — drunk- 
enness and indolence — and had hereby been compelled 
to give up his business. But the wretch, instead of 
learning wisdom from misfortune had, in the exercise of 
his functions as beadle, found food for his favorite foibles. 
He never did any work, but drank so hard with the 
coachmen who drove the wedding-parties to the church, 
with the undertaker’s men, and with the parson’s pen- 
sioners, that his face was scarlet even at noon. 

Thus Mme. Cantinet. after having (as she said) 
brought her husband a portion amounting to twelve 
thousand francs, found herself doomed to an old ag6 
of penury. The story of her wrongs had been dinned 
into the ears of Dr, Poulain a hundred times ; and it 
occurred to him that Mme. Cantinet might be serviceable 
in facilitating the introduction of Mme. Sauvage as cook* 


802 


‘‘DAME SAUVAGE EEAPPEARS.” 

and charwoman into the establishment of Pons and 
Schmucke. To introduce Mme. Sauvage point-blank 
was out of the question, for the mistrust of the Pair of 
Nut-Crackers had become quite absolute ; f/iaf was made 
abundantly clear to Fraisier by the refusal to open the 
door to Mile. Remonencq. But that the pious musicians 
would accept, without the slightest hesitation, the ser- 
vices of any person recommended by the Abbe Duplanty, 
seemed equally clear to Fraisier and Poulain. Accord- 
ing to their plan Mme. Cantinet was to be accompanied 
by Mme. Sauvage ; and, once introduced into the 
citadel, Fraisier’s housekeeper would be as efficient as 
Fraisier himself. 

When the Abbe Duplanty had reached the entrance 
gate-way on his way out, he was delayed for a moment 
by the crowd of Cibot’s friends who had gathered there 
to show the interest they felt in the oldest and most 
respected co7icierge of the Quarter. 

Dr. Poulain bowed to the abbe and, taking him aside, 
said to him : 

“ I am just going to pay a visit to poor Monsieur 
Pons ; he may pull through yet, if we can persuade him 
to submit to an operation for the extraction of the stones 
which have formed in the gall-bladder. They are pal- 
pable to the touch, and give rise to an irritation which 
must terminate fatally, unless the cause is removed ; 
but it is perhaps not yet too late to attempt the opera- 
tion. You ought to use your influence over your peni- 
tent to induce him to undergo the operation. I will 
answer for his recovery, unless some unfavorable acci- 
dent should supervene.” 

“As soon as I have taken the holy pyx back to the 
church, I will return,” said the Abbe Duplanty ; “ for 


363 


‘‘ DAME SAUVAGE RF:APPEARS.” 

Monsieur Schmucke’s state of mind is such that he is in 
need of religious consolation.” 

“I have just learned that he is thrown upon his own 
resources,” said Dr. Poulain. “ The worthy German 
had a little altercation with Madame Cibot this morn- 
ing ; but since she has acted as the housekeeper of these 
two gentlemen for ten years, the misunderstanding will, 
no doubt, be merely temporary ; still, in the meantime, he 
must not be left to his own devices, in the position 
which he will be called upon to face. To look after him 
is a work of charity. I say, Cantinet,” cried the doctor, 
summoning the beadle, “ask your wife whether she is 
willing to nurse Monsieur Pons, and act as Monsieur 
Schmucke’s housekeeper for a few days, in the place of 
Madame Cibot — who, by the way, even if this little quar- 
rel had not arisen, would still have been obliged to find 
a substitute. Madame Cantinet is an honest woman,” 
added the doctor, addressing the Abbe Duplanty. 

“Oh, you couldn’t make a better choice,” replied the 
worthy priest ; for Madame Cantinet enjoys the confi- 
dence of the authorities as collector of the pew-rents.” 

A few minutes later Doctor Poulain, seated at the 
bedside of Pons, was watching his expiring agonies. 
Schmucke besought his friend to allow the operation to 
be performed. But he besought in vain. The only 
replies vouchsafed by the old musician to the supplica- 
tions of the poor broken-hearted German were a shake 
of the head, and now and then a gesture of impatience. 
Finally, collecting all his strength, the dying man cast a 
terrible glance at Schmucke, and exclaimed : “ Surely 

you might let me die in peace !” 

This look, this language, caused poor Schmucke a 
pang that almost killed him ; but' taking Pons’ hand, he 
gently kissed it, and retaining it between his own hands, 


364 “ DAME SAUVAGE REAPrEAKS.*' 

endeavored once again to communicate his vital heat to 
the body of his friend. Just at that moment Dr. Pou- 
lain, hearing the bell ring, went to the door and admitted 
the Abbe Duplanty. 

“Our poor invalid is just entering upon his death- 
struggle. A few hours hence he will be dead ; you will, 
no doubt, send a priest to watch by the body to-night. 
But it is high time to call in Madame Cantinet and a 
charwoman to help Monsieur Schmucke ; he is utterly 
incapable of giving a single thought to any subject ; I 
tremble for his reason, and there is some valuable prop- 
erty here which ought to be in the custody of honest 
folks.” 

The Abbe Duplanty, good, easy, unsuspecting priest, 
was struck by the justice of Dr. Poulain’s observations. 
He entertained, moreover, a very favorable opinion of 
the doctor of the district. Accordingly, he went to the 
threshold of the chamber of death, and made a sign for 
Schmucke to come and speak to him. Schmucke could 
not make up his mind to resign Pons’ hand, which was 
contracting and clutching the hand of Schmucke, as if 
the dying man were tumbling over a precipice, and were 
ready to catch at anything that would arrest his fall. 
But the dying, as every one is aware, are subject to an 
hallucination which impels them — like persons trying to 
rescue their most precious property from the flames of 
a conflagration — to fasten on everything that comes in 
their way. Thus it came to pass that Pons released the 
hand of Schmucke, and seizing the bedclothes, gathered 
them about his body with a hurried movement that was 
instinct with avarice. 

“What will you do when you are left alone with your 
dead friend?” asked the worthy clergyman, when 


DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEARS.” 365 

Schmucke, thus released, went to hear what he had to 
say. “You have no Madame Cibot now — ” 

“She is a raonzder'who has murdered Bons !“ said 
Schmucke. 

“ But you must have some one by your side,” replied 
Dr. Poulain, “ for some one must sit up with the body 
to-night.” 

“ / will zit up ; I will bray to Got !” replied the guile- 
less German. 

“ But you must eat ! — who is there to do your cooking 
for you now ?” observed the doctor. 

“ Grief takes away my abbedide !” replied Schmucke, 
artlessly. 

“But,” said Poulain, “you will have to go, accompa- 
nied by witnesses, and report the death ; the body must 
be stripped and wrapped in a shroud ; the funeral must 
be ordered ; and food prepared for the nurse who looks 
after the body and the priest who sits up with it. Can 
you do all that yourself ? In the capital of the civilized 
world, people do not die like dogs !” 

Schmucke’s eyes grew big with fright. He was 
seized with a brief access of insanity. 

“ But Bons will not die — I will zave him !” he 
exclaimed. 

“You cannot hold out long without getting a little 
sleep, and then who is to take your place ? for Monsieur 
Pons must be attended to. There must be some one to 
give him his draughts, and to prepare his medicine — 

“Ah,dat is true,” said the German. 

“Well, then,” resumed the Abbe Duplanty, “ I think 
of sending Madame Cantinet to you ; she is a worthy, 
honest woman — ” 

So completely was Schmucke bewildered by the 


8f)f> DAME SAUVAGE KEAPPEARS.” 

enumeration of his social duties to his dead friend, that 
he could have wished to die with Pons. 

“He’s a mere child !’’ remarked Poulain to the Abbe 
Duplanty. 

“A ghild !’’ echoed Schmucke, mechanically. 

“Well,” said the curate, “I will go and speak to 
Madame Cantinet and send her to you.” 

“You needn’t put yourself to that trouble,’’ said the 
doctor ; “she lives close by me, and I am going home.’’ 

Death is like an invisible assassin, with whom the 
dying carry on a combat. In the death-throes they 
receive their final wounds, and in the effort to return 
those wounds they struggle. Pons had now reached 
this final stage ; he began to utter groans, interspersed 
with shrieks ; whereupon Schmucke, the Abbe Du- 
planty and Poulain hastened to the bedside of the 
dying man. All at once Pons received in the centre of 
vitality that final blow which severs the bonds that unite 
the body to the soul ; regained, for a few moments, the 
perfect calm which ensues when the death-struggle is 
over, and, restored to himself with all the serenity of 
death upon his countenance, glanced almost gayly at 
those who stood around |;iim. 

“Ah ! doctor, I have had a hard time of it, but you 
were right, I am better now. Thanks, my good abbe, I 
was asking myself where Schmucke was.’’ 

“Schmucke has eaten nothing since four o’clock yes- 
terday afternoon ; you had no one to wait upon you, 
and it would be dangerous to call Madame Cibot in 
again — ’’ 

“She is capable of any atrocity!’’ said Pons, who 
made no attempt to disguise the horror with which the 
mere mention of Dame Cibot’s name inspired him. 


DAME SAUVAGE REAPPEAKS.” 367 

“You are right; Schmucke requires the assistance of 
some one who is thoroughly trustworthy.” 

Hereupon Poulain interposed : “The Abbe Duplanty 
and I have laid our heads together, and — ” 

“Oh! thank you,” said Pons. “I had not thought 
about the matter.” 

“ — And the abbe suggested the name of Madame 
Cantinet — ” 

“Oh ! the pew-opener!” cried Pons. “Yes, she is an 
excellent creature.” 

“ She has no love for Madame .Cibot,” resumed the 
doctor, “and she will take good care of Monsieur 
Schmucke — ” 

“ Send her to me, dear Monsieur Duplanty — her and 
her husband ; then I shall feel easy. She won’t steal 
anything that is here.” 

Schmucke had now repossessed himself of Pons’ hand 
and was gleefully clasping it. He believed that his 
friend was restored to health. 

“Let us be off, Monsieur L’Abbe,” said the doctor; 
“ I will send Madame Cantinet here forthwith ; I under- 
stand these matters ; ’tis very likely that she will not 
find Monsieur Pons alive.” 


368 


“ DEATH IN ITS STE*RN REALITY,” 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY. 

While the Abbe Duplanty was engaged in prevailing 
on the dying man to engage Mme. Cantinet, in the 
capacity of nurse, Fraisier had summoned the pew- 
opener to his office, and was subjecting her to his 
corrupting conversation and to the influence of his 
petifogging artifices — an influence not easily resisted. 
Accordingly, Madame Cantinet, a lean, bilious-looking 
woman with big teeth and pallid lips, a woman who, in 
common with many women in the lower ranks of life, 
had been rendered stupid by misfortune, and had come 
to such a pass that even the smallest daily gains seemed 
affluence to her, was easily persuaded to introduce Mme. 
Sauvage as charwoman. Fraisier’s housekeeper had 
already received the word of command ; and had prom- 
ised to weave a net-work of iron about the two 
musicians, and to watch them as a spider watches a 
fly that has been caught in the spider’s web. A licensed 
tobacco-shop was to be Mme. Sauvage’s reward. It 
was thus that Fraisier purposed to himself to get rid of 
his pretended nurse, and in her person to place a spy 
and a policeman at Mme. Cantinet’s elbow. As there 
was a servant’s room and a small kitchen attached to 
the suite of apartments occupied by the two friends. 
Dame Sauvage would be able to find sleeping accom- 
modation and to do such cooking as Schmucke might 
require. 

Pons had just drawn his last breath when the two 


DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY. 


869 


u 


5V 


women arrived, escorted by Dr. Poulain. The German 
was still clasping between his hands the hand of his 
departed friend, from which the warmth of life was 
gradually receding. He motioned to Mme. Cantinet to 
be silent ; but the martial aspect of Mme. Sauvage 
threw him so entirely off his guard that he suffered a 
gesture — such as that masculine lady was thoroughly 
familiarized with — to escape him. 

“ This lady,” said Mme. Cantinet, “is a person recom- 
mended by M. Duplanty ; she has been cook to a 
bishop, and is honesty itself ; she will look after the 
cookery.” 

“ Oh, you may speak up now,” cried the burly and 
asthmatic Mme. Sauvage ; “ the poor gentleman is dead ! 
he has just gone !” 

At these words Schmucke uttered a piercing shriek ; 
he could feel the ice-cold hand of Pons growing rigid, 
and he kept his eyes fixed upon those of Pons, the 
expression of which would soon have driven him mad 
but for the interposition of Mme. Sauvage, who, accus- 
tomed, as she doubtlessly was to scenes of this descrip- 
tion, approached the bed, holding in her hand a looking- 
glass which she placed before the dead man’s lips. 
When she saw that no breath escaped from them to dim 
the surface of the mirror, she snatched Schmucke’s hand 
away from that of the corpse, exclaiming, as she did so : 

“ Let it go, monsieur, can’t you ? or you won’t be able 
to get your hand away at all. You don’t know how 
stiff the bones will grow ! Dead folks grow cold quickly, 
I can tell you. If one donT lay out the body while it is 
still warm, one has to break the limbs later on — ” 

To close the eyes, then, of the poor dead musician, fell 
to the lot of this terrible woman, who forthwith pro- 
ceeded, as is the wont of those who follow the calling of 


370 DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.” 

sick-nurse — a calling to which she had devoted herself 
for the last ten years — to undress Pons and to lay 
him out at fhll length, placing the arms and hands 
close to the sides of the corpse, and drawing the bed- 
clothes over its face. All this was done with the cool 
and practiced skill of a shopman making up a parcel of 
goods. 

“ I want a sheet to wrap him in ; where is one to be 
found ?” she inquired of Schmucke, who was dismayed 
at her proceedings. He had seen religion treating with 
the most profound respect the being who was destined 
to so lofty a future beyond the skies. This species of 
packing, in the course of which his friend was treated as 
a things caused Schmucke a pang that was enough to 
destroy the very elements of thought. 

“ Do what you bleaze !” he mechanically replied. 

This was the first time that this unsophisticated 
creature had seen any person die ; and this person was 
Pons, his only friend, the only being who had under- 
stood and loved him ! 

“Well, then, I shall go and ask Madame Cibot where 
the sheets are to be found," said Dame Sauvage. 

“We shall want a folding-bed for this lady to sleep 
upon," said Mme. Cantinet to Schmucke, who merely 
nodded his head and burst into tears. Thereupon, Mme. 
Cantinet left the poor man in peace ; but in an hour’s 
time she came back to him and said : “ Have you any 

money, monsieur, that you can give me to make some 
purchases with ?" 

Schmucke turned to Mme. Cantinet a face whose 
expression would have disarmed the fiercest hate. He 
pointed to the white, wan, sharpened features of the 
corpse as if they were a sufficient answer to every ques- 
tion ; 


“death in its stern reality.” 371 

“Take everything, and let me weep and pray,” said 
he, sinking down upon his knees. 

Mme. Sauvage meanwhile had rushed away to 
announce the death of Pons to Fraisier. Fraisier, on 
hearing this news, jumped into a cabriolet and drove 
straight to Mme. Camusot’s to bespeak, for the morrow, 
the power of attorney authorizing him to act on behalf 
of the heirs. 

“Monsieur,” said Mme. Cantinet to Schmucke after 
an hour bad elapsed since her former question ; “ I have 
been to Madame Cibot, who must be familiar with vour 
household arrangements, to ask where I can lay my 
hands on what is wanted ; but as she has just lost her 
husband she well-nigh killed me with abuse. Will you 
be good enough to listen to me, monsieur — ” 

Schmucke merely stared at the woman, who was all 
unconscious of the barbarity of her conduct ; for the 
common people are accustomed passively to submit to 
the acutest moral suffering. 

“ Monsieur, we are in want of some linen for a shroud, 
and of money to buy a folding-bed for this lady, a 
kitchen-range, plates, dishes and glasses ; for we shall 
have a priest passing the night here, and the lady can 
find absolutely nothing in the kitchen.” 

“Why, monsieur,” chimed in Dame Sauvage, “I must 
have some firewood and coals to prepare the dinner, and 
I can find nothing at all. There is nothing very aston- 
ishing in thaty however, being as Dame Cibot found 
everything for you.” 

“ But, my good lady,” said Mme. Cantinet, pointing 
to Schmucke, who was lying in a state of total insensi- 
bility at the feet of the corpse ; “you will not believe 
me when I tell you that he won’t reply to any ques- 
tion.” 


o~i'l “ DEATH IN ITS STEKN KEALITY.” 

“ Well, then, my darling," said Dame Sauvage ; “ since 
that is so, I will show you what we do in these cases." 

Hereupon Dame Sauvage, having examined the room 
with a glance, just as robbers throw around them in 
order to discover the hiding-places that are likely to 
contain money, went straight to Pons’ commode, opened 
the top drawer, and there discovered the purse in which 
Schmucke had placed what remained of the money 
produced by the sale of the pictures. Taking up the 
purse she showed it to Schmucke, who. gave a 
mechanical sign of assent. 

“ Here is some money, my darling !" said Dame 
Sauvage to Mme. Cantinet. “I will count it and take 
what is necessary to buy what we lack— wine, food, can- 
dles, everything, in short, for nothing have they now. 
Search the chest of drawers for a sheet to wrap the body 
in. Well might they tell me that this poor gentleman 
was simple-minded. Simple-minded, good lack ! I 
can’t tell exactly what he is; but he is worse than 
simple-minded. He is like a new-born babe ; we shall 
have to feed him with pap — " 

Schmucke watched the two women and their proceed- 
ings exactly as a lunatic might have watched them. 
Broken down with grief, and plunged into a quasi- 
cataleptic state, he kept his eyes fixed upon the fascinat- 
ing face of Pons, the contours of which had gained in 
purity under the influence of the absolute repose of 
death. Schmucke longed to die; he was utterly indif- 
ferent to all terrestrial things. Had the room been 
wrapped in flames, he would not have budged an inch. 

“There are twelve hundred and fifty-six francs," said 
Dame Sauvage to Schmucke, who merely shrugged his 
shoulders. But when Dame Sauvage wanted to sew the 
body in the shroud and to measure the sheet against the 


‘‘ DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.” 373 

corpse, so that she might cut it to the proper length 
before she began to stitch it, there eusued between her 
and the poor German a fearful struggle. Schmucke 
behaved exactly like a dog that bites all those who 
attempt to touch his master’s corpse ; till Dame Sauvage, 
losing all patience, seized the old man, thrust him into 
an arm-chair, and held him there with herculean force. 

“ Now, now, my darling,” cried she to Mme. Cantinet. 
“ you sew the body in its shroud.” 

When the operation was complete. Dame Sauvage 
restored Schmucke to his former position at the foot of 
the bed, and said to him : “ Do you understand ? It was 
absolutely necessary to truss the poor man like a corpse, 
as he is.” 

Schmucke began to cry ; and the two women, leaving 
him to his own devices, proceeded to take possessioh of 
the kitchen, which they very soon stocked with all the 
necessaries of life. Having made out a preliminary bill 
of three hundred and sixty francs. Dame Sauvage set to 
work to prepare a dinner for four persons, and what a 
dinner it was, to be sure ! There was the cobbler’s 
pheasant — a fat goose — to form the staple of the meal ; 
a sweet omelet ; a green salad ; and the prescriptive 
soup and bouilli, the ingredients of which were so super- 
abundant that the broth looked like the jelly of meat. 

At nine o’clock in the evening the priest sent by the 
curate to watch by Pons’ body presented himself, 
accompanied by Cantinet, who brought with him four 
wax tapers and some of the church candlesticks. The 
priest found Schmucke stretched out at full length upon 
the bed beside the body of his friend, and holding it 
lightly clasped in his arms. Yielding to the authority 
of religion, and to that only, Schmucke tore himself 
away from the corpse, and sunk upon his knees, while 


374 


“ DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.’' 


the priest cozily ensconced himself in the arm-chair. 
While the latter was reading prayers, and Schmucke, 
kneeling before the corpse, was beseeching God to work 
a miracle, and unite him to Pons so that they might 
both be buried in one grave, Mme. Cantinet had marched 
off to the Temple to buy a folding bedstead and a com- 
plete set of bed furniture for Madame Sauvage ; for the 
purse of twelve hundred and fifty-six francs was in a 
state of pillage. At eleven o’clock Mme. Cantinet came 
to see whether Schmucke would like a morsel to eat ; 
but the German made a sign that he wished to be left 
alone. 

“ Supper is waiting for you. Monsieur Pastelot,” said 
the pew-opener, turning to the priest. 

When Schmucke found himself alone there stole over 
his features a smile resembling that of a madman who 
finds himself at liberty to gratify some longing as fan- 
tastic as the whims of a pregnant woman ; he threw 
himself upon the body of his friend, and once more 
clasped it in a close embrace. When at midnight the 
priest returned and reprimanded Schmucke, the latter 
relinquished his hold upon the corpse, and resumed his 
prayers. At day-break the priest departed ; and at 
seven in the morning Dr. Poulain paid Schmucke a 
kindly visit, and pressed him to eat ; but the German 
refused. 

“If you don’t eat something now, you will feel fam- 
ished on your return,” said the doctor ; “for you must 
go to the mairie^ accompanied by the witness, to report 
the death of Monsieur Pons, and have it duly registered.” 

“ I !” cried the German, in dismay. 

“ Who else ? You can’t avoid the necessity, since you 
are the only person who was present when he died — ” 


‘‘ DEATH IN ITS STER^iT REALITY.’’ 375 

“ I gannot walk,” replied Schmucke, invoking the aid 
of Dr. Poulain. 

“ Take a vehicle,” gently replied the hypocritical 
doctor. “ I have already given a certificate of the 
decease. Ask some one in the house to go with you. 
These two ladies will look after the apartments while 
you are away.” 

It is extremely difficult to picture to one’s self the full 
extent of the suffering to which the exactions of the law 
subject the genuine mourner. ’Tis enough to make one 
hate civilization, to make one prefer the customs of sav- 
ages. 

At nine o’clock Mme. Sauvage contrived to get 
Schmucke down-stairs by supporting him under the 
arm-pits ; but when he had taken his seat in the hack- 
ney coach he was obliged to beg Remonencq to go 
with him to the mairie to register the death of Pons. 
In Paris, in the metropolis of this land which is intox- 
icated with the love of equality, inequality of rank 
stares you in the face, go where you may, do what you 
will. This persistent force of circumstances obtrudes 
itself upon our notice, even in the events that death 
brings in its train. Among the wealthy, some friend, 
relative, or professional man relieves the mourner from 
the burden of these harrowing details ; but, like taxes, 
they fair in full force upon the poor — those help- 
less proletarians who have to bear the brunt of suffer- 
ing. 

“ Ah ! you have good reason to regret him,” said 
Remonencq by way of response to a plaintive cry from 
the poor martyr ; “ for he was a fine fellow, a thor- 
oughly honest man ; and he leaves a noble collection 
behind him, too ; but do you know, monsieur, that you, 
being as you are a foreigner, will be placed in a very 


376 DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.” 

uncomfortable position; for folks are a-saying in all 
quarters that you are Monsieur Pons’ heir.” 

Schmucke did not hear one syllable of what was said 
to him. His grief was so profound as to border on 
insanity. There is a tetanus of the mind as well as of 
the body. 

“And you would do well to get a lawyer or some pro- 
fessional man to act as your representative,” pursued 
Remonencq. 

“A professional man!” echoed Schmucke, mechani- 
cally. 

“ You will find that you’ll want some one to represent 
you. If I was you, now, I should get a man of exper- 
ience — some man who is known in the Quarter — some 
one as you can trust. For my part, in all my little busi- 
ness matters I employ Tabareau, the bailiff. And if you 
gave a power of attorney to his managing clerk you 
wouldn’t be worried, not one bit.” 

This suggestion, which Fraisier had prompted, and 
the offer of which Remonencq and Dame Cibot had 
mutually arranged, dwelt in Schmucke’s memory ; for 
on those occasions when (figuratively speaking) sorrow 
may be said to freeze the mind by arresting the normal 
current of ideas, the memory retains all such impres- 
sions as it accidentally receives. Yet while Schmucke 
was listening to Remonencq, the old German gazed 
at him with an eye from which all trace of intelligence 
had so entirely vanished that the broker held his 
tongue. 

“ If he remains in this idiotic condition,” thought 
Remonencq, “ it will be an easy matter for me to buy 
all the rattle-traps up yonder for a hundred thousand 
francs if he is the owner of them. Here we are at the 
mairie^ monsieur,” said he, aloud. 


‘‘ DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.” 377 

Remonencq was forced to help Schmucke out of the 
hackney-coach and to support him in their progress to 
the office of the registrar of births, deaths and mar- 
riages. 

Arrived there, Schmucke found himself in the midst 
of a wedding-party ; nor was this all ; he was obliged- 
to wait till his turn came ; for by one of those coinci- 
dences that so often occur at Paris, the clerk had five 
or six deaths to register. During this interval the poor 
German must have undergone an agony scarcely less 
intense than that of the Saviour of mankind. 

“ Are you Monsieur Schmucke ?” inquired a man 
dressed in black, addressing himself to the German, 
who was astounded at the mention of his name. At the 
person who thus accosted him Schmucke stared with 
the dazed expression with which he had encountered the 
remarks of Remonencq. 

“ What do you want with him ?” said the broker to 
the stranger. “ Can’t you leave the man alone ? Don’t 
you see that he is in trouble ?” 

“You have just lost your friend, monsieur, and you 
would like to raise a fitting monument to his memory ; 
for you are his heir,’’ said the stranger ; “ I am sure 
monsieur would not like to act shabbily ; monsieur 
will no doubt purchase a plot of ground in perpetuity 
for a grave. Then Monsieur Pons was such a friend to 
the arts ! It would be a great pity not to place 
upon, his tomb Music, Painting and Sculpture — three 
beautiful figures at the foot of the grave, bathed in 
tears — ” 

Remonencq here indulged in a repellent gesture 
worthy of a son of Auvergne, to which the man 
responded by another gesture which might be called 
a commercial gesture, and said as plainly as words 


378 


“ DEATH TN ITS STERN REALITY.'' 

could have said : “ Can’t you let me transact my busi- 
ness !” 

The broker perfectly understood it. 

“ I am agent to the house of Sonet & Co., funeral 
monument contractors,” pursued the tout, whom Walter 
•Scott would have nicknamed You?ig Mortality. “If 
monsieur should think fit to intrust us with the order, 
we would save him the trouble of going into th'e city to 
purchase the ground needed for the interment of the 
friend whom the Arts have lost — ” 

Remonencq nodded his head by way of expressing 
his assent, and nudged Schmucke’s elbow. 

“ It happens to us every day to undertake, on behalf 
of families, the due execution of all formalities,” pur- 
sued the tout, encouraged by the Auvergnat’s gesture. 
“ In the first moment of sorrow it is very difficult for an 
heir to attend in person to these details, and we are 
accustomed to perform these little services for our 
clients. Our monuments, monsieur, are charged for at 
so much per meter, either in freestone or marble. We 
open the ground for family graves. We undertake 
everything at the most reasonable prices. It was our 
house that executed the magnificent monument of the 
beautiful Esther Gobseck and Lucien de Rubempre, 
one of the most magnificent ornaments of Pere-Lachaise. 
We employ the very best workmen ; and,” added he 
(as he saw another man dressed in black approaching, 
with the view of putting in a word for some other firm 
in the marble and sculpture line), “ I invite monsieur to 
be on his guard against the small contractors, who turn 
out nothing but trumpery.” 

It has often been said that death is the end of a 
journey ; but it is not generally known how thoroughly 
apposite is the metaphor as applied to death in Paris. 


“ DEATH IN ITS STERN REALITY.’’ 379 

A corpse, especially if it be the corpse of a man of 
quality, is greeted on the sombre shore very much as a 
traveler disembarking in a seaport town is besieged and 
badgered by all the hotel touts in the place. Since 
philosophers and those families which, being convinced 
of their perpetuity, «build themselves sepulchers just as 
they build themselves mansions, stand alone in taking 
any thought of death and of the social consequences 
that death involves, it always comes too soon ; and this 
the more in that a very intelligible sentiment precludes 
expectant heirs from treating it even as a possible event. 
Hence, it almost invariably happens that those who have 
the misfortune to lose father, mother, wife, or child, are 
immediately assailed by business touts who take advan- 
tage of the confusion of distress to snap an order. In 
by-gone days the funeral monument contractors (whose 
establishments are all grouped together in the vicinity 
of the world-famed cemetery of Pere-Lachaise, and have 
there formed a street which might well be called the 
Rue des Tombeaux) used to beset the heirs in the neigh- 
borhood of the grave or as they issued from the ceme- 
tery; but urged by competition — which is the genius 
of commerce — these contractors imperceptibly gained 
ground, and have nowadays invaded the city itself and 
pushed on as far as the approaches to the various mairies. 
In fact, into the very house of death do the touts of 
these enterprising men of business force their way, a 
design for a gravestone in their hands. 

“/am doing business with this gentleman,” said the 
tout of the firm of Sonet & Co. to the supervening tout. 

“ Pons, deceased ! Where are the witnesses sung 
out the attendant at the registry. 

“ Come, monsieur,” said the tout, addressing Remon- 
encq. 


380 ‘‘death in its stern reality.” 

Remonencq begged the man to raise Schmucke, who 
remained seated on the bench like a mass of inanimate 
matter. The two men led him to the railing behind 
which the registrar shelters himself from the public 
grief. Remonencq — Schmucke’s temporary providence 
— was assisted in his task by Dr. Poulain, who had pre- 
sented himself for the purpose of supplying the necessary 
information as to Pons’ age and place of birth. The 
German knew one fact and only one — Pons had been 
his friend ! When the signatures had been affixed, 
Remonencq and the doctor, followed by the tout, pro- 
ceeded to place the poor German in the carriage, into 
which the zealous tout, in his anxiety to secure the 
order for the stone, likewise slipped. Dame Sauvage 
was on the lookout at the entrance gate-way, and she, 
with the help of Remonencq and the tout of Messrs. 
Sonet & Co., carried the almost fainting Schmucke to 
his rooms. 

“He is going to swoon,” cried the tout, who was 
anxious to bring to a conclusion the piece of business 
which, according to him, was already on foot. 

“ You are quite right !” replied Dame Sauvage. “ He 
has done nothing but cry for the last twenty-four hours, 
and has refused all nourishment. There is nothing like 
grief for exhausting the stomach.” 

“ Now, my dear client,” said the tout of Messrs. 
Sonet, “ do just take a little broth ; you have so many 
things to do, you know ; you have to go to the Hotel 
de Ville to buy the ground on which you are about to 
erect a monument in commemoration of this friend of 
the Arts, and in token of your gratitude.” 

“ Why, such conduct is not rational,” said Mme. 
Cantinet, bringing in some broth and a piece of bread. 

“Bethink you, my dear sir,” said Remonencq, 


381 


‘‘death in its stern reality.” 

“ bethink you, if you are so weak as all that, to get some 
one to act as your agent ; for you have your hands full of 
business ; the funeral must be ordered ! Sure^^, you 
don’t want your friend to be buried like a pauper, do 
you ?” 

“ Come, come, my good sir,” said Dame Sauvage ; and 
seizing a favorable moment when Schmucke’s head was 
reclining upon the back of an arm-chair, she poured a 
spoonful of soup into his mouth and began to feed the 
reluctant German as if he had been a child. 

“ Now, if you were wise, sir, you would call some one 
in to act as your representative, since your desire is 
quietly to abandon yourself to your grief.” 

“ Since monsieur intends to erect a magnificent monu- 
ment to the memory of his friend, all he need do is to 
authorize me to take the necessary steps, and I will 
do—” 

“ What is all this about ? What is all this about ?” 
interposed Dame Sauvage. “ Monsieur has given you 
an order? Who you^ pray?” 

“ One of the agents of the firm of Sonet & Co., my 
good lady, the largest contractors for funeral monuments 
in Paris,” said the tout, taking from his pocket a card 
which he presented to Dame Sauvage. 

“ Well, well, all right, all right ; we will send to you 
when it is convenient ; but you mustn’t take advantage 
of this gentleman’s condition. You can see clearly that 
he is not in full possession of his senses — ” 

“ If you can manage to secure us the order,” whispered 
the tout of Messrs. Sonet & Co. to Mme. Sauvage, as he 
led her out on to the landing, “ I am authorized to offer 
you forty francs.” 

“Well, give me your address,” said the mollified Dame 
Sauvage, 


382 ‘‘death in its stern rkality.” 

Schmucke, finding himself alone, and feeling all the 
better for the bread and soup which he had at least 
swallowed if he had not digested, now hurried back to 
Pons’ room and resumed his prayers. He was plunged 
into the profoundest abysses of sorrow when he was 
recalled from his state of utter self-forgetfulness by a 
young man clad in black who was saying to him for the 
eleventh time: “Monsieur — ” an interpellation which 
the more readily attracted the attention of the old man 
in that he at the same time felt a tug at his coat-sleeve. 

“ What do you want now ?’’ 

“ Monsieur, we are indebted to Dr. Gannal for a sub- 
lime discovery ; far be it from us to contest his glory ; 
he has renewed the miracles of Egypt ; but at the same 
time, certain improvements have been introduced, and 
the results we have obtained are quite surprising. There- 
fore, if you wish to see your friend again, just as he was 
when alive — ” 

“Zee him again!” exclaimed Schmucke. “Will he 
zbeak to me ?” 

“ Well, not exactly. He will do everything /^/^/speak,” 
replied the embalmer’s tout. “ And then he will remain 
to all eternity in the state in which he is when the 
embalmment takes place. The operation occupies only 
a few minutes ; an incision in the carotid artery and the 
injection are all that is requisite ; but it is high time to 
begin ; if you were to delay the operation for another 
quarter of an hour you would be deprived of the sweet 
satisfaction of having preserved the body.” 

“ Away wid you to de tefil !” said Schmucke ; “ Pons 
is a zbirit, and dat zbirit is wid God !” 

“ That fellow hasn’t a grain of gratitude in him,” said 
the stripling tout of one of the rivals of the celebrated 


schmucke’s martyrdom.” 


888 


Gannal, as he passed through the carriage gate-way. 
“ He declines to have his friend embalmed !" 

“ What can you expect, monsieur," said Dame Cibot, 
who had just had her darling embalmed. “ The man is 
an heir, a legatee. When once the dead man’s goose is 
cooked he is nothing whatever to them folks." 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

“ CONTINUATION OF SCHMUCKe’s MARTYRDOM. — EXPLA- 
NATION OF HOW PEOPLE DIE IN PARIS." 

An hour afterwards Schmucke beheld Mme. Sauvage, 
followed by a man who was dressed in black and looked 
like a workman, enter the apartment. 

“ Monsieur," said she, “ Cantinet has been good enough 
to send this gentleman here ; he is the coffin-maker to 
the parish." 

The coffin-maker bowed with an air of commiseration 
and condolence, but still, like a man who is sure of his 
ground, and knows himself to be indispensable, he gazed 
with the eye of a connoisseur at the corpse. 

“How would monsieur like the thing to be made 
Of deal, plain oak, or oak lined with lead ? Oak lined 
with lead is the correct thing. The body is of aver- 
age length," said the coffin-maker, who began to handle 
the feet of the corpse in order to take its measure. 

“ Five feet six and a half," added he. “ Monsieur, no 
doubt, intends to order a funeral service at church T 

Schmucke shot at the man a succession of glances 
resembling those of a madman meditating an assault. 


384 


‘‘ schmucke’s martyrdom.” 


“Sir,” said Dame Sauvage, “you really ought to 
employ somebody to take all these matters of detail off 
your hands.” 

“ Yez,” assented the victim at last. 

“ Shall I go and fetch Monsieur Tabareau to you ; for 
your hands will soon be quite full ? Monsieur Tabareau, 
d’ye see, is the most trustworthy man in the district.” 

“Yes, Monsieur Dapareau ! His name has peen men- 
tioned to me,” replied Schmucke. 

“Well, then monsieur will be at peace and at liberty 
to indulge his grief after one conference with his proxy.” 

At about two o’clock M. Tabareau’s managing clerk, 
a young man who intended to become a bailiff, modestly 
presented himself to Schmucke. Astonishing are the 
privileges of youth ; it never inspires horror !' This 
young man, whose name was Villemot, seated himself 
by Schmucke’s side and waited for a fitting opportunity 
of speaking to him. This reserve made a very favorable 
impression on Schmucke. 

“ Monsieur,” said the youth, “ I am the managing clerk 
of Monsieur Tabareau, who has confided to me the task 
of looking after your interests in this place, and attend- 
ing to all the details of your friend’s interment. Is it 
your good pleasure that I should do so?’’ 

“ You will not zave my life, for I have not long to liff ; 
but you will leave me in beace, will you not ?” 

“ Oh, you shall not be exposed to a single interrup- 
tion,” replied Villemot. 

“ Well, what muzt I do to zegure dat ?” 

“ Sign this document appointing Monsieur Tabareau 
your proxy in all matters relating to the succession.” 

“ Goot, goot, giff it to me,” said the German, eager to 
sign the document without a moment’s delay. 

“ No, no ; I must first read the deed over to you.” 


^r( 



YOU ARE THE TALK OF THE AVHOLE HOUSE,” SAID DAME SAUVAGE. 

—See Page 408. 



“ schmtjcke’s martykdom.’^ 


385 


“ Read on.” 

Without having paid the slightest attention to the 
language of this general authority, Schmucke executed 
it ; and the youth then proceeded to take Schmucke’s 
orders with reference to the purchase of the plot of 
ground (which the German hoped might serve as his 
grave also) and with respect to the funeral service at the 
church. Villemot assured Schmucke that he would not 
be molested any further and would not be asked to find 
any money. 

“ I would giff all dat I bozzezz to be left alone,” said 
the unhappy man ; and he once more threw himself 
upon his knees before the body of his friend. 

Thus, then, Fraisier was triumphant ; the legatee was 
unable to stir hand or foot beyond the circle within 
which Mme. Sauvage and Villemot held him inclosed. 

There is no sorrow sleep cannot subdue. Accordingly, 
when the day was drawing to a close. Dame Sauvage 
found Schmucke fast asleep, stretched at full length 
across the foot of the bed on which the body of Pons 
was lying. Raising him in her arms she laid him in his 
own bed, and, having tucked him up with motherly care, 
left him. Schmucke slept till morning. When he awoke, 
or rather, when, after this brief truce, he was restored 
to the consciousness of his misfortunes. Pons’ body was 
lying beneath the carriage gate-way in such a state as is 
accorded to third-class funerals. In vain, therefore, did 
Schmucke search for the body of his friend in these 
apartments, which now seemed to him quite vast, and 
void of all save harrowing mementoes. 

Dame Sauvage, who ruled the old German with all the 
authority that a nurse exercises over her urchin, insisted 
on his eating some breakfast before he set out for church ; 
and while the poor victim was forcing himself to eat, she 


386 ‘‘schmucke’s martyrdom.” 

lifted up her voice and with lamentations worthy of 
Jeremiah himself called Schmucke’s attention to the fact 
that he had no black coat to put on ; and indeed, it must 
be confessed that Schmucke’s wardrobe, under the care 
of Mme. Cibot, had, before Pons had fallen ill, arrived 
f>ari passu with. Schmucke’s dinner at its simplest expres- 
sion — to wit, two pairs of trousers and two coats ! 

“ Do you mean to say that you are going to attend 
Monsieur Pons’ funeral dressed as you are ? Why, it’s 
an outrage on decency, gross enough to make the whole 
Quarter cry shame upon you !” 

“ How would you have me go, den T* 

“Why, in mourning, to be sure !” 

“ In mourning ?” 

“ The usages of society — ” 

“De uzages of zoziety ! Mudge I gare for all zudge 
trivialities !” said the poor man, who was now worked 
up to the highest pitch of exasperation that a child-like 
mind bowed down with sorrow can attain. 

“ Why, ’tis a perfect monster of ingratitude,” quoth 
Dame Sauvage, turning to a gentleman who had sud- 
denly entered the room, and whose aspect made 
Schmucke shudder. 

This functionary, who was magnificently arrayed in 
coat and waistcoat of black cloth, black breeches, black 
Vilk stockings, white ruffles, silver chain with pendant 
medal, the primmest of white muslin cravats and white 
gloves ; this typical offlcial, stamped with one uniform 
stamp for all sorts and conditions of mourners, held in 
his hand an ebony wand, the symbol of his functions, 
while beneath his left arm he carried a three-cornered 
hat decked with a tricolor cockade. 

“ I am the master of the ceremonies,” said this per- 
sonage, in subdued tones. 


“schmuoke’s martyrdom.” 387 

The routine of his daily duties had accustomed this 
man to the conduct of funerals and brought him into 
close contact with groups of relatives plunged in a 
common sorrow — real or feigned. Hence he, like all 
his compeers, had contracted a habit of speaking in low 
and gentle accents ; his mission was to be decent, 
polished and conventional, like a statue representing 
the genius of death. His announcement caused 
Schmucke a nervous tremor akin to that which the 
sight of the public executioner would have excited. 

“ Monsieur, are you the son, the brother, or the father 
of the deceased ?” inquired the man of office. 

“ I am all dat, and more — I am his friend !” said 
Schmucke, weeping profusely. 

“Are you the heir of the deceased ?” asked the master 
of the ceremonies. 

“ De heir?” echoed Schmucke. “All worldly matters 
are alike to me.” And he relapsed into the attitude 
characteristic of his dull despair. 

“ Where are the relatives,- the friends ?” inquired the 
master of the ceremonies. 

“ Dere dey are, all of dem !” cried Schmucke. Dose 
friends never gauzed my boor Bons any zuffering ! 
Dey are all he gared for bezides me !” 

“ He is mad, monsieur,” said Dame Sauvage to the 
master of the ceremonies. “ Proceed ; it is wasting time 
to listen to what he says.” 

Schmucke had now resumed his seat, and, having sub- 
sided into his previous idiotic condition, was mechani- 
cally drying his tears. At this moment Villemot, 
Maitre Tabareau’s managing clerk, came into the room; 
whereupon the master of the ceremonies, recognizing 
in him the person who had given the directions for the 
funeral, said to him : “ Well, monsieur, it is time to 


388 


“ schmucke’s martyrdom.” 


start ; the hearse is at the door ; but I own I have 
rarely witnessed such a funeral as this. Where are the 
relatives and friends of the deceased ?” 

“We have been somewhat pushed for time,” replied 
M. Villemot. “ This gentleman’s grief was so profound 
that he took no thought of anything ; but there is only 
one relative — ” 

The master of the ceremonies cast a look of sympathy 
at Schmucke. That expert in sorrow was at no loss to 
distinguish the genuine from the false ; so he went up 
to Schmucke and said to him : “ Come, my dear mon- 
sieur, take courage ! Think of the respect that is due 
to the memory of your friend.” 

“We forgot to issue invitations; but I took care to 
send a special messenger to Monsieur le President de 
Marville, the one relation whom you heard me allude 
to. There are no friends — I do not suppose that the 
people connected with the theatre in which the 
deceased acted as conductor of the orchestra will come. 
But I believe that this gentleman is his universal lega- 
tee.” 

“ Then he must be chief mourner,” said the master of 
the ceremonies. 

“ You haven’t a black coat ?” said he, interrogatively, 
as his eye fell upon Schmucke’s costume. 

“ Dere is noting but mourning in my heart,” said the 
poor German ; “ mourning so deep dat I can feel dat I 
am dying. Got vill not witdold from me de fafor of 
uniting me to my friend in de grafe, and I tank Him for 
it !” 

So saying, he clasped his hands together. 

“ I have told our Board ” (which has already intro- 
duced so many improvements), resumed the master of 
the ceremonies, addressing Villemot, “that they ought 


schmucke’s martyrdoh.” 


389 


to set up a vestiary and lend out mourning costumes 
for hire — ’tis a desideratum that becomes more and 
more urgent every day. But since this gentleman is 
the heir, he ought to wear the mourning cloak, and 
that which I have brought with me will envelope him 
from head to foot, so that no one will be able to 
detect the unsuitability of his dress. Will you have 
the goodness to stand up ?” said he, turning to 
Schmucke. 

Schmucke rose, but his legs gave way beneath him. 

“ Do you support him,” said the master of the cere- 
monies to the managing clerk, “ since you are acting as 
his proxy.” 

Villemot placed his arms beneath those of Schmucke, 
and thus supported him ; while the master of the 
ceremonies, taking one of those ample, but hideous, 
sable mantles which are worn by heirs when they follow 
the hearse from the house of death to the church, fas- 
tened it under Schmucke’s chin by means of a couple 
of black silk strings. 

And lo, Schmucke in the garb of heir ! 

“ And now, we have a serious difficulty to surmount,” 
said the master of the ceremonies. “ There are four 
pall-tassels to be held. If no one attends the funeral, 
who is to hold them ? It is now half past ten,” said he, 
after consulting his watch. “ They are waiting for us 
at the church.” 

“Ah! Here comes Fraisier !” exclaimed Villemot, 
most imprudently. 

But there was no one present to pick up this confession 
of simplicity. 

“ Who is this gentleman ?” asked the master of the 
ceremonies. 

“ Oh ! he’s the family.” 


390 


sohmucke’s martyrdom.” 


What family ?” 

“ The disinherited family. He is the proxy of 
Monsieur le President Camusot.” 

“Good !” said the master of the ceremonies, with an 
air of satisfaction. “We shall have at least two pall- 
bearers ; you will be one, and he will be the second.” 

Delighted at finding a couple of pall-bearers, the 
master of the ceremonies went and fetched two pairs of 
splendid white deerskin gloves and politely handed a 
pair, first to Fraisier and then to Villemont. 

“ Will each of you two gentlemen oblige me by holding 
one of the pall-tassels?” said he. 

Fraisier, ostentatiously attired in a complete suit of 
black — Fraisier, with his white tie and semi-official 
aspect, was enough to make one shudder. There were 
a hundred writs in his very look. 

“ Most willingly, monsieur,” was his reply. 

“If two other persons would but present themselves, 
we should have four pall-bearers,” said the master of the 
ceremonies. 

At this critical moment in came the indefatigable tout 
of Messrs. Sonet & Co., followed by the only person who 
had not forgotten Pons, and bethought him of paying 
the last tribute of respect to the memory of the poor 
musician. This man was a supernumerary at the thea- 
tre, whose office was to lay the music on the stands in 
the orchestra, and to whom Pons, knowing him to be a 
married man with a family, had been in the habit of 
presenting a monthly donation of five francs. 

“Ah! Dobinard ” (Topinard), exclaimed Schmucke, 
when he recognized the young man, *^you love Bons, 
then !” 

“ Why, monsieur, every day, as sure as morning came, 


“ schmucke’s martyrdom. ’’ 


391 


I have come here to learn how Monsieur Pons was 
going on.” 

Effery day! Boor Dobinard !” said Schmucke, 
squeezing the understrapper’s hand. 

“ But no doubt they took me for a relative of Monsieur 
Pons, and received me with a very bad grace. It was 
no use my saying that I belonged to the theatre, and 
that I came to hear how Monsieur Pons was getting on ; 
they told me that they weren’t to be taken in in that 
fashion. I asked to be allowed to see the poor invalid, 
but I was never permitted to go up to his rooms.” 

“ Dat infamous Zibod !” said Schmucke, pressing the 
horny hand of the underling of the theatre to his heart. 

“He was the king of men, was that worthy Monsieur 
Pons. Not a month passed that he didn’t give me five 
francs. He knew that I had a wife and three children. 
My wife is waiting at the church.” 

“ I will zhare my pread wid you !” exclaimed 
Schmucke, in his joy at having near him a man to whom 
Pons was dear. 

“ Will you hold one of the tassels of the pall, 
monsieur?” said the master of the ceremonies. “We 
shall then have four pall-bearers.” 

For the master of the ceremonies had easily prevailed 
upon the tout of Messrs. Sonet & Co. to be one of the 
pall-bearers. That worthy, even had he been reluctant 
to undertake the office, could not have resisted its 
tempting perquisites — the splendid pair of gloves ! 

“It is now a quarter to eleven ! We must really go 
down at once ; the priests are waiting for us,” said the 
master of the ceremonies. 

Thereupon the six persons we have named began to 
march down-stairs. 

“ Take care to secure the outer door and remain in the 


392 


“ schmucke’s martyrdom.” 


apartments,” said the atrocious Fraisier to the two 
women who were standing on the landing ; “especially 
if you want to be appointed custodian, Madame Cantinet. 
Ah ! ah ! ’tis forty sous a day in your pocket !” 

Through one of those coincidences which are by no 
means infrequent in Paris, the entrance gate-way was 
encumbered by two catafalques — and therefore by two 
funerals — that of Cibot, the defunct porter, and that of 
Pons. No one visited the brilliant catafalque of the 
friend of the Arts, there to pay a tribute of affection ; 
whereas all the porters in the neighborhood crowded in 
to sprinkle holy water on the mortal remains of the 
deceased porter. This contrast between the throng 
attendant on the funeral of Cibot and the solitude that 
surrounded the body of Pons was conspicuous, not only 
at the door of the house, but also in the street. There 
the only mourner who followed Pons’ coffin was 
Schmucke, who was supported by an undertaker’s man ; 
for he staggered with weakness at every step. From 
the Rue de Normandie to the Rue d’Orleans (in which 
street the church of St. Francis is situated) the two 
funerals passed along, between two hedges of inquisitive 
spectators ; for in this district, as we have already 
remarked, every incident is an event. Hence, the splen- 
did white hearse, with its depending scutcheon on which 
a large P was embroidered, and its solitary mourner, 
on the one hand, and the plain hearse adopted in funerals 
of the cheapest class, with its accompanying crowd, on 
the other, failed not to elicit considerable comment. 
Fortunate it was that Schmucke, dazed by the faces that 
thronged the windows, and by the two long rows of 
congregated quidnuncs, was deaf to every word that was 
uttered, and saw the vast concourse only through a haze 
of tears. 


^‘schmucke’s martyrdom.” 393 

“Ah! ’tis the Nut-Cracker,” exclaimed one, “the 
m'usician, you know !” 

“ Who are the pall-bearers, then T* 

“ Oh ! nothing but actors !” 

“See, there is poor Daddy Cibot’s funeral! Well, 
there’s one hard-working man the less ! What a cor- 
morant for work he was !” 

“ Ay, he never went out at all !” 

“ No, he didn’t keep Saint-Monday.” 

“ Ah ! how fond he was of his wife, to be sure !” 

“Yes, indeed ; she’s greatly to be pitied !” 

Remonencq, following in the wake of his victim’s 
hearse, received many a condolence for the loss of his 
neighbor. 

Thus the two funerals reached the church. There 
Cantinet co-operated with the Swiss to shield Schmucke 
from the importunities of the mendicants. Villemot had 
promised the legatee that he should not be molested, 
and Villemot, true to his word, kept a watchful eye 
upon his client, and disbursed all the necessary expenses. 
The escort of from sixty to eighty persons, that accom- 
panied the humble hearse containing the corpse of 
Cibot, followed it to the cemetery. When Pons’ funeral 
issued from the church it was followed by four mourning 
coaches — one for the clergy and the three others for the 
relatives of the deceased. But one carriage was quite 
sufficient ; for the tout of Messrs. Sonet & Co. had 
rushed off, while the funeral service was in progress, 
to report the departure of the procession to M. Sonet, in 
order that he might be in readiness to present the 
design for the monument and an estimate of its cost to 
the universal legatee as he quitted the cemetery 
Fraisier, Villemot, Schmucke and Topinard occupied 
one coach ; the other coaches, instead of returning to 


394 


sohmuoke’s martyrdom.” 


the undertaker’s, drove to Pere-Lachaise, empty. This 
superfluous procession of unoccupied carriages is a very 
common phenomenon. When the deceased is a person 
unknown to fame, and there is, consequently, but a 
sparse collection of mourners, there are always too many 
mourning coaches. Deep, indeed, must have been the 
love inspired by the dead, during their life-time, to 
induce the world of Paris — Paris where every one would 
like to add a twenty-fifth hour to the day — to follow a 
friend or a relative as far as the cemetery ! But the 
drivers would lose their drink-money if they shirked 
their duties ; so, full or empty, the coaches go from the 
house to the church, from the church to the cemetery, 
and from the cemetery back again to the house ; and 
there the drivers claim their drink-money. The number 
of persons to whom Death is a drinking-trough is incon- 
ceivable. When the funeral ceremony is over, beadles, 
sextons, sprinklers of holy water, paupers, coffin-bearers, 
coachmen, grave-diggers — all these absorbent organisms 
— scramble, distended with liquor, into a hearse and 
are driven away. 

From the door of the church (where the legatee, as 
soon as he appeared, was assailed by a swarm of beggars 
— whom the Swiss immediately repelled) to the ceme- 
tery of Pere-Lachaise, poor Schmucke was borne along 
much as criminals used to be dragged from the palace 
to the Place de Greve. He seemed to be following his 
own funeral, as he sat in the coach clasping the hand of 
Topinard, the only man who shared his genuine sorrow 
for the death of Pons. Topinard, meanwhile, deeply 
impressed with the honor of having been selected as 
one of Pons’ pall-bearers — Topinard, pleased with his 
ride — Topinard, the proud possessor of a pair of white 
deerskin gloves, was beginning to regard the day of 


SCHMUCKE^S MARTYEDOM.” 


395 


Pons' funeral as one of the red-letter days of his exist- 
ence. Schmucke, plunged in the profoundest sorrow, 
but deriving some support from the contact of the 
hand whose owner had a heart, passively submitted to 
be driven to the cemetery — just as an ill-starred calf is 
trundled unresistingly to the shambles. Now, those who 
have had the misfortune to follow many a relative to 
the last resting-place, are well aware that, during the 
journey from the church to the grave, all hypocrisy is 
laid aside ; for the distance to be traversed is frequently 
considerable — as, for example, it often is between the 
church where the service has been performed and the 
Cimetiere de I’Est, which is conspicuous among Parisian 
cemeteries, as the focus of every kind of variety and 
pomp, and is crowded with sumptuous sepulchers. The 
conversation is started by the indifferent ; and, in the 
end, the saddest listen to and are amused by it. 

Monsieur le President had gone down to court, when 
the procession set forth,” quoth Fraisier to Villemot, 
“ and I deemed it unnecessary to call him away from 
his duties at the palace, since he could not have joined 
us in time. Inasmuch as he — the natural and lawful 
heir — has been disinherited in favor of Monsieur 
Schmucke, I thought it quite sufficient that he should be 
represented by his proxy.” 

On hearing these words Topinard pricked up his 
ears. 

‘‘Who was that queer fellow who held the fourth tas- 
sel ?” said Fraisier to Villemot. 

“ Oh ! he’s the tout of a firm of tombstone contractors 
who want to get an order for a tomb to be adorned with 
three marble figures representing Music, Painting and 
Sculpture, weeping over the grave of the deceased.” 

“Not at all a bad idea,” replied Fraisier. “ The old 


396 


“ schmucke’s martyrdom.” 


fellow certainly deserves it ; but such a monument as 
that will cost seven or eight thousand francs." 

“Oh ! no doubt it will." 

“If Monsieur Schmucke gives the order it cannot in 
any way affect the estate ; for such expenses as those 
would soon eat up a succession." 

“ It might give rise to an action ; but you’d win it." 

“Well, then," replied Fraisier, “it is his lookout! It 
would be a good trick to play these contractors," whis- 
pered he to Villemot ; “for if the will be set aside, or if 
no will were forthcoming, who is to pay them ?" 

Villemot greeted this suggestion with a monkey’s 
grin ; and thereupon the managing clerk of M. Tabareau 
and the man of law proceeded to hold a whispered con- 
versation together. But, in spite of their precautions 
and the rumbling of the coach, the supernumerary, 
versed as he was in all the intrigues of the greenroom, 
guessed that the two limbs of law were bent upon 
involving the poor German in some difficulty, and finally 
caught the significant word, Clichy 1 Thereupon, the 
honest and worthy underling of the theatre resolved that 
he would take Pons’ friend under his wing. 

On reaching the cemetery — in which Villemot, aided 
by the tout of Messrs. Sonet & Co., had bought from 
the municipality a plot of ground about ten feet three 
quarters square, on the plea that he was about to erect 
thereon a splendid monument — Schmucke was con- 
ducted, by the master of the ceremonies, through a 
crowd of sightseers, to the grave into which Pons’ 
remains were about to be lowered ; but at sight of the 
rectangular hole over which hung Pons’ coffin, sus- 
pended on ropes which four mem held in their hands, 
while the priest uttered the final prayer, the hapless 
German was so intensely affected that he swooned. 


397 


SUCCESSION.’^ 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

“ WHEREIN ONE LEARNS THAT WHAT IS CALLED * OPEN- 
ING ’ A SUCCESSION CONSISTS IN ‘ CLOSING ’ EVERY 
DOOR.’' 

Topinard, the tout of Messrs. Sonet & Co,, and M. 
Sonet himself, carried the poor German into the marble 
merchants’ establishment, where He received the most 
assiduous and generous attention at the hands of Mme. 
Sonet and Mme. Vitelot, the wife of M. Sonet’s partner. 
Topinard stood his ground, for he had seen Fraisier 
(whose face seemed to him to savor strongly of the gal- 
lows) in close converse with the tout of Messrs. Sonet & 
Co. 

After the lapse of an hour — that is to say at about half 
past two — the poor harmless German recovered conscious- 
ness. Schmucke thought that he had been dreaming for 
the last two days, and that he would wake to find Pons 
still alive. His forehead was piled with wet cloths ; he 
was plied with smelling-salts and vinegar, till at length 
he opened his eyes. Then Mme. Sonet made him drink 
some good strong broth ; for the marble-merchants had 
not omitted to set the pot-au-fen upon the fire. 

“We don’t often come across clients who feel so 
keenly as all that ; still, we do occasionally meet them 
once in two years or so !” said the lady. At last 
Schmucke began to talk about getting back to the Rue 
de Normandie. 

Thereupon Sonet produced the design and said : 
“This, monsieur, is the drawing which Viteloc has 
made expressly for you ; he sat up all night over it ! 


398 


“a succession.” 

But he was in a happy vein. It will be a very fine 
monument — ” 

“ It will be one of the finest in Pere-Lachaise !” cried 
little Mme. Sonet. “But then it is your duty to show 
respect to the memory of a friend who has left you his 
whole fortune — ” 

Now, this design, which was supposed to have been 
made expressly for Pons, had, as a matter of fact, been 
prepared for De Marsay, the celebrated minister ; but 
his widow, being desirous that his monument should be 
designed by Stidmann, the design prepared by these man- 
ufacturers of monuments was rejected ; for a common- 
place monument was disgusting to the widow. The 
three figures were originally intended to represent the 
three days of the Revolution of July, during which the 
great minister came to the front. By introducing sun- 
dry modifications, Sonet and Vitelot had since contrived 
to make the three, glorious days represent the Army, 
Finance and the Family, for the monument of Charles 
Keller — a monument which also was intrusted to the 
skill of Stidmann. For the last eleven years had this 
design been from time to time adapted to meet the 
varying predicaments of several bereaved families ; but 
by counter-drawing, Vitelot had managed to transform 
the three figures into the genii of Music, Sculpture and 
Painting. 

“ It’s a mere trifle if you take into consideration the 
amount of workmanship and the setting up ; but it 
won’t take more than six months,’’ said Vitelot. “ Here 
is the estimate and specification, monsieur — seven thous- 
and francs, exclusive of the workmen’s wages.” 

“ If monsieur would like it in marble,” chimed in 
Sonet, whose specialty was marble, “ it will come to 


399 


A SUCCESSION.’’ 

twelve thousand francs, and monsieur will immortalize 
his friend and self together.” 

“I have just this moment heard that the will will be 
disputed, and that the heirs will be restored to their 
rights,” whispered Topinard to Vitelot ; “you had bet- 
ter go and see Monsieur le President Camusot, for this 
poor inoffensive creature won’t have a farthing.” 

“You are always bringing us clients of that kind !” 
said Mme. Vitelot, turning round upon and beginning 
to quarrel with the tout. 

Leaning on Topinard’s arm, Schmucke walked back 
to the Rue de Normandie, for the mourning coaches 
had already driven back thither. 

“Do not leaf me !” said Schmucke to Topinard, who 
so soon as he had confided the poor musician to the 
care of Mme. Sauvage, wanted to get away. 

“It is four o’clock, my dear Monsieur Schmucke, and 
I must go home to dinner — my wife, who is a box- 
keeper, won’t know what has become of me. You 
know, the theatre opens at a quarter to six.” 

“ Yez, I know — but conzider, I am alone in de vorld, 
widout a friend. You, who have mourned for Bons, gif 
me a little guidance ; I am in profo'und darkness, and 
Bons said that I was zurrounded by rogues.” 

“ Yes, I very soon found that out ; I have just saved 
you from being sent to Clichy !” 

“Gligy?” exclaimed Schmucke; “I don’t understand 
you.” 

“ Poor man ! Well ! Make your mind easy ; I will 
come and see you. Good-bye.” 

“Atieu ! for a little while !” said Schmucke, sinking- 
down as if he were weary unto death. 

“Adieu ! mossieu !” quoth Dame Sauvage to Topin- 


400 


"A STTCCESSION.” 

ard, in a manner that made a forcible impression on the 
supernumerary. 

“Ah ! what is the matter with you, Mrs. House- 
keeper.?” cried Topinard, jocosely. “There you stand 
like a villain in a melodrama.” 

“Villain yourself !” quoth the dame. “Why do you 
come here interfering? I suppose you’ll be wanting to 
undertake Monsieur Schmucke’s business, and to bleed 
him !” 

“Bleed him, indeed! — your humble servant!” re- 
torted Topinard, proudly. “I am but a poor super at 
the theatre, but I love artists, and, let me tell you, I 
have never asked any one for a farthing ! Have I asked 
you to give me anything ? Do I owe you anything — eh, 
old girl ?” 

“You are a super, and your name is — what?” asked 
the virago. 

“ Topinard, very much at your service — ” 

“Many thanks to you,” said Dame Sauvage, “and 
present my compliments to medeme if you a married 
man, mosieur. I know all I wanted to know, now.” 

“What ails you, my beauty?” said Mme. Cantinet, 
coming forward. 

“What ails me, little one? Why just this, that you 
must stay here and look after the dinner, while I pro- 
ceed to put my foot into that gentleman’s affairs — that’s 
what’s the matter with me !” 

“ He’s down below talking to poor Madame Cibot, 
who’s crying her very eyes out,” replied Dame Cantinet. 
Dame Sauvage ran down-stairs so hastily that they 
trembled beneath her feet. 

“ Monsieur,” said she to Fraisier, drawing him some 
little distance away from Dame Cibot, and pointing to 
Topinard as the supernumerary passed out, proud of 


401 


SUCCESSION.” 

having already discharged the debt ne owed his bene- 
factor, by employing a greenroom artifice — for every 
one connected with the stage has a certain fund of wit 
and humor — to save the friend of that benefactor from 
falling into a trap. In fact, the supernumerary secretly 
resolved that he would protect the unsuspecting musi- 
cian of his orchestra against the snares that would be 
laid for him. 

“You see that little wretch?” pursued Dame Sauvage, 
“ ’tis a sort of a kind of an honest man who wants to 
poke his nose into M. Schmucke’s affairs — ” 

“Who is he?” asked Fraisier. 

“ Oh ! a mere nobody — ” 

“ In business, there is no such thing as a 7nere 
nobody y 

“Well,” said the dame, “ he’s an underling at the the- 
atre ; his name is Topinard.” 

“Good !” said Fraisier, “go on as you have begun, 
Madame Sauvage, and you will have your tobacco- 
shop.” 

Thereupon, Fraisier resumed his conversation with 
Mme. Cibot — “ I say, therefore, my dear client, that you 
have been playing a double game with us, and that we 
are in no way bound to keep terms with a partner who 
deceives us.” 

“And in what way have I deceived you, pray ?” said 
Dame Cibot, with her arms akimbo. “ Do you think 
that you’re a-going to frighten me with your vinegar 
looks and freezing airs? You’re just trying to forge 
excuses for going away from your word, and you call 
yourself a gentleman. Shall I tell you what you are ? 
You’re a scamp. Yes, yes, you may scratch your 
arm as much as you please ; but put that in your 
fob—” 


402 


“a sfooession.’’ 

“ Now, let’s have no angry words, my pet,” said 
Fraisier. “ Listen to me ! You have feathered your 
nest. This very morning while the preparations for the 
funeral were in train, I found this duplicate catalogue, 
which* is, throughout, in the handwriting of Monsieur 
Pons ; and, by the merest chance, my eye encountered 
this and opening the catalogue, Fraisier read aloud 
these words : 

“ ‘ No. 7. Magnificent portrait painted on marble, by 
Sebastian del Piombo in 1546, sold by a family which 
had carried it off from the cathedral of Terni. This 
portrait, the companion to which was a bishop, bought 
by an Englishman, represents a Knight of Malta pray- 
ing, and was placed over the tomb of the Rossi family. 
But for its date the picture might be ascribed to 
Raphael. This little painting appears to me to be 
superior to the portrait of Baccio Bandinelli in the 
museum, which is somewhat faded, whereas the Knight 
of Malta is extremely fresh in consequence of the preser- 
vation of the coloring on the Lavagna (Slate).’ 

I found, on examination,” resumed Fraisier, “ that 
place No. 7 was occupied by the portrait of a lady 
(signed Chardin), which had no No. 7. While the 
mast^ of the ceremonies was making up his quorum of 
pall-bearers, I verified the pictures, and there are eight 
ordinary pictures, without numbers, in the places 
allotted to works which were described as master- 
pieces by the late Monsieur Pons, and are now no 
longer to be found. Finally, there is missing a little 
picture on wood, by Metzu, which is described as a 
chef-d'oeuvre — ” 

“ Was I the custodian of the pictures ?” asked Dame 
Cibot. 

“ No ; but you were the confidential housekeeper in 


403 


“a succession.’^ 

charge of Monsieur Pons’ establishment, and if robbery 
has been committed — ” 

“Robbery indeed ! Let me just n’inform you, mon- 
sieur, that the pictures were sold by Monsieur Schmucke, 
in obedience to the directions of Monsieur Pons, n’and 
to supply his wants.’’ 

“To whom were they sold ?’’ 

“ To Messieurs Elie Magus and Remonencq.” 

“ For how much ?” 

“ Why, I really don’t remember.” 

“ Now, listen to me, my dear Madame Cibot,” pursued 
Fraisier. “You have feathered your nest, and feath- 
ered it well ! I shall keep my eye upon you ; I have 
you in my power. Serve me, and I will hold my 
tongue. In any case, you understand, 3^ou mustn’t 
expect to receive anything from Monsieur le President 
Camusot, since you have thought fit to plunder 
him.” 

“ I felt quite sure as it would all turn to pudding 
bones, as far as I was concerned, my dear Monsieur 
Fraisier,” replied Dame Cibot, mollified by the words 
/ will hold my tongue. 

“There you are now,” said Remonencq, coming to 
the rescue, “picking a quarrel with madame ; it isn’t 
right. The sale of the pictures was arranged, at Mon- 
sieur Pons’ free will and pleasure, between himself and 
Magus and me ; it took us three days to come to terms 
with the deceased, who positively dreamed about his 
pictures ! We have formal receipts for the money, and 
if, as always happens, we gave madame a few forty- 
franc pieces, she had no more than we are in the habit 
of giving to the servants of the gentry-folks with whom 
we do a bit of business. Ah ! my dear sir, if you think 
as you are imposing on a. helpless woman, you’ll find 


404 


SUCCESSION.” 

yourself very much mistaken ! Do you take me, Mr. 
Pettifogger? Monsieur Magus rules the market, and if 
you don’t give way to madame, if you don’t give her 
what you promised her. I'll be at your heels when the 
collection is sold, and you’ll see what you’ll lose if you 
have Monsieur Magus and me against you — us as can 
raise all the dealers against you. Instead of seven or 
eight hundred thousand francs, you won’t get even so 
much as two hundred thousand !” 

“ All right ! All right ! We’ll see about that ! We 
won’t sell at all,” said Fraisier, “or, if we do, we’ll sell 
in London.” 

“We know London quite well!” said Remonencq ; 
“ and Monsieur Magus has quite as much influence there 
as he has in Paris.” 

“Good-bye, madame, I will settle your business for 
you,” said Fraisier, “unless you continue to do exactly 
what I tell you,” he added. 

“ You little pickpocket — ” 

“Take care,” said Fraisier, “ I shall soon be 2ijuge de 
paix." 

Thus, with mutual menaces, the force of which was 
correctly appreciated by each of them, did these two 
worthies part. 

“ Thank you, Remonencq,” said Dame Cibot. “ It’s 
very pleasant for a poor widow to find some one n’as’ll 
take her part.” 

That evening, at about ten o’clock, Gaudissard sum- 
moned to his private room the attendant on the orchestra 
of the theatre. When Topinard presented himself, the 
manager was standing with his back to the fire-place, in 
a Napoleonic attitude which he had cultivated since he 
had assumed the direction of a host of actors, dancers, 
figuranti, musicians, and machinists, and been called 


A SUCCESSION.” 


405 


upon to deal with authors. His habit was to pass his 
right hand beneath his waistcoat and grasp the left 
brace, while he presented the three-quarter face and 
gazed at vacancy. 

“ How now, Topinard ; have you a private income ?” 

“ No, monsieur.” 

“ Then you are on the lookout for a better place ?” 
inquired the manager. 

. “ No, monsieur — ” replied the supernumerary, turning 
pale. 

What the devil ! your wife is box-keeper on the first 
tier. I showed my respect for my ruined predecessor by 
retaining her services. I gave you day-work by making 
you lamp-cleaner to the greenroom, and you have the 
musical scores to look after into the bargain. Nor is 
that all. You have an allowance of twenty sous to 
represent the monsters and lead the troops of devils 
when we bring hell upon the stage ! Your position is 
the envy of all the supers in the house, and you are 
regarded with no favorable eye by your colleagues, my 
friend. You have enemies in the theatre — ” 

Enemies !" exclaimed Topinard. 

“ — And you have three children, the eldest of whom 
plays children’s parts, and has an allowance of fifty 
centimes ! — ” 

“ Monsieur — ” 

“ — Let fne speak,” cried Gaudissard, in a voice of 
thunder. “ Holding the position you do, you want to 
leave the theatre — ” 

“ Monsieur — ” 

“ — You must needs poke your nose into business 
matters and thrust your finger into succession-pies I 
Why, you luckless wight, you’ll be crushed like an egg. 
I have a patron in the person of his Excellency Mon- 


406 “ A SUCCESSION.” 

seigneur le Comte Popinot — a man of talent and of high 
character, whom the king has been wise enough to 
summon to his council-table. Well, this statesman, this 
first-rate politician — I am speaking of Count Popinot — 
has married his son to the daughter of the President de 
Marville, one of the most estimable and one of the most 
esteemed of the judges of the highest grade, one of the 
luminaries of the court at the palace — you know the 
palace, don’t you ? Well, then, this Monsieur de Marville 
is the natural heir of his cousin Pons, our former con- 
ductor, whose funeral you attended this morning. Now 
observe ; I don’t blame you for having gone to pay this 
last tribute of respect to the poor fellow ; but you will 
lose your berth if you interfere in the affairs of our 
worthy Monsieur Schmucke, toward whom I entertain 
the most friendly feelings, but who will shortly find him- 
self placed in a very delicate position in relation to the 
natural heirs of Pons. And since this German is of very 
little consequence to me, while the president and Count 
Popinot are of a great deal of consequence to me, I 
recommend you to leave the worthy German to unravel 
his own affairs. The Germans have a special Providence 
of their own, and you would be entirely out of place as 
a subaltern deity. So remain as you are — a super ! You 
can’t do better !” 

“ Enough, Monsieur le Directeur,” said Topinard, 
deeply grieved. Thus was Schmucke, who expected 
that the humble supernumerary, the only being, himself 
excepted, who had shed a tear over Pons’ grave, would 
pay him a visit on the morrow, deprived of the only pro- 
tector that chance had sent him. When that morrow 
dawned upon the luckless German and he gazed upon 
the empty rooms, he felt the immensity of the loss that 
he had sustained. On the two preceding days, the 


‘‘a succession.” 407 

hurry of events and the turmoil that death brings in its 
train had involved Schmucke in the bustle and commo- 
tion that furnishes distraction to the eye. But in the 
silence that follows the burial of a friend, a father, a 
son, or a woman who was dear to us — the dull, cold 
silence of the morrow — there is something that is terrible 
— something that is icy. Poor Schmucke was drawn to 
Pons’ chamber by an irresistible attraction ; but, unable 
to endure the sight of the apartment, he immediately 
withdrew, and returned to the dining-room, where Mme. 
Sauvage was laying breakfast. Schmucke placed him- 
self at the table, but could eat nothing. Suddenly there 
came a smart ring at the bell, and three men in black 
entered, unopposed either by Mme. Cantinet or Mme. 
Sauvage. This trio consisted of M. Vitel the juge de paix^ 
his registrar and — Fraisier, who now, in consequence of 
the check he had sustained, through the execution of a 
formal will which destroyed that formidable weapon — 
the testament that he had so audaciously stolen — was 
more lean and hungry than ever. 

“ We have come to affix the seals of the law here, 
monsieur,” said the juge de paix to Schmucke, mildly. 

Schmucke, to whom these words were so much Greek, 
cast a timorous glance at the three men. 

“We have come at the instance of Monsieur Fraisier, 
advocate, the proxy of Monsieur Camusot de Marville, 
who is the natural heir to his cousin the late Monsieur 
Pons,” added the registrar. 

“The collections are there, in the large saloon and in 
the bedroom of the deceased,” said Fraisier. 

“Well, then, let us go in,” said juge de paix. 
“ Excuse us, monsieur ; pray go on with your break- 
fast ; don’t let us interfere with you.” 


408 SUCCESSION.” 

The irruption of these three men in black had frozen 
the poor German with terror. 

“ This gentleman," said Fraisier, darting at Schmucke 
one of those poisonous glances wherewith he was wont 
to mesmerize his victims, just as a spider mesmerizes a 
fly, “ this gentleman, who has managed to procure the 
making of a will par devant tiotaire in his favor, must be 
fully prepared for some opposition from the family of 
the testator. A family does not passively submit to 
spoliation at the hands of a foreigner ; and we shall see 
which will be victorious, monsieur ; fraud and corrup- 
tion or the family ! We, as the natural heirs, are enti- 
tled to demand the affixation of the seals ; and affixed 
the seals shall be ; and, moreover, it is my intention to 
see that this protective measure is carried out with the 
utmost possible rigor ; and so it shall be." 

“ Mein Got ! Mein Got ! what zin againzt Heaven 
have I gommitted ?" cried the inoffensive Schmucke. 

“ You are the talk of the whole house," said Dame 
Sauvage. “While you were asleep, there came a little 
stripling, dressed in black, a little puppy who said he 
was managing clerk to Monsieur Hannequin ; and he 
insisted on speaking to you ; but as you were asleep 
and so thoroughly worn out with the ceremony of yes- 
terday, I told him that you had given a power of 
attorney to Monsieur Villemot, managing clerk to Mon- 
sieur Tabareau, and that he must go and see Villemot 
if business was his game. ‘Ah,’ said the young man, 
‘ so much the better, I shall soon come to an under- 
standing with hhn. We are going to deposit the will in 
court as soon as we have exhibited it to the president." 
Thereupon, I begged him to send Monsieur Villemot to 
us as soon as ever he could. Make your mind easy, my 
dear sir," continued Dame Sauvage, “ you’ll find folks 


“a succession.” 409 

to stand up for you ; you won’t be fleeced just as much 
as people choose ; you’ll have some one on your side 
who has teeth and claws ! Monsieur Villemot will soon 
show ’em what’s what ! For my part, I’ve already had 
a tiff with that low-lived creature, Mother Cibot, a por- 
tress, forsooth, who must needs take upon herself to 
pa^judgment on her lodgers, and who maintains that 
you’ve filched this fortune from the lawful heirs, that 
you kept Monsieur Pons shut up and made a mere tool 
of him, and that he was raving mad. I gave her a fine 
wigging, the wicked wretch, I promise you ! ‘You’re a 
thief and a scum !’ I says to her, says I ; ‘ and you’ll 
find yourself in the dock, on account of what you’ve 
stolen from your gentlemen.’ And then she shut her 
mug.” 

“ Monsieur,” said the registrar, coming in to look for 
Schmucke ; “ do you wish to be present while the seals 
are being affixed in the chamber of the deceased ?” 

“ Go on ! Go on !” said Schmucke. “ I brezume dat 
I shall be allowed to die in beaze ?” 

“ People are always at liberty to die,” said the regis- 
trar, “and successions form the bulk of our business ; 
but I have seldom seen a universal legatee follow his 
testator into the grave.” 

“/ shall follow mine^'' said Schmucke, who, after the 
repeated blows he had received, felt intolerable pangs 
in the region of the heart. 

“Ah! here is Monsieur Villemot,” exclaimed Dame 
Sauvage. 

“Monsir Fillemod,” said the hapless German, “ will 
you rebrezent me ?” 

“ I hurried hither to tell you that the will is per- 
fectly formal, and will no doubt be upheld by the court. 


410 


‘‘a succession.” 

which will put you in possession of the estate — and a 
fine fortune you will have.” 

“/a fine fortune !” ejaculated Schmucke, horrified at 
being suspected of cupidity. 

“ Meanwhile,” said Dame Sauvage, “ I should like to 
know what the juge de paix is about, with his tapers and 
little bits of tape.” ^ 

“ Oh ! He is affixing the seals. Come, Monsieur 
Schmucke ; you have a right to be present.” 

“ No ! No ! do you go dere, instead.” 

“But wherefore the seals, if monsieur is in his own 
house, and if everything belongs to him ?” quoth Dame 
Sauvage, laying down the law after the fashion of 
women, who, one and all, interpret the code according 
to their own good pleasure. 

“ But monsieur is not in his own house, madame ; he 
is in Monsieur Pons’ house ; everthing will belong to 
him, no doubt ; but when one is legatee, one cannot 
take possession of the property composing the succession 
without what is called a writ of possession. That writ 
is issued by the court. Now, if the heirs who have been 
ousted from the succession, by the voluntary act of the 
testator, oppose the writ of possession, there arises a law- 
suit. And, inasmuch as it is uncertain to whom the suc- 
cession will be awarded, all the goods and chattels of 
the deceased are placed under seal, and the respective 
notaries of the heirs and legatee will proceed to take the 
inventory in due course of law. Do you see ?” 

On hearing this jargon for the first time in the course 
of his life, Schmucke entirely lost his head. He allowed 
it to sink on to the back of the arm-chair in which he 
was seated ; it felt so heavy that he could not support 
its weight. Villemot, meanwhile, entered into conver- 
sation with the registrar, and, with all the imperturba- 


411 


“a succession.’’ 

bility of the professional lawyer, looked on during the 
apposition of the seals — a ceremony which, in the 
absence of any relative, is generally accompanied by a 
running commentary of jokes and remarks about the 
objects which are being thus locked up until the day 
arrives for their distribution. 

At length the four men of law closed the door of 
the saloon, and returned to the dining-room, whither 
the registrar betook himself. Schmucke mechanically 
watched the operation, which consists in affixing the 
official seal of the juge de paix to either end of a piece of 
tape stretched across the aperture, in the case of fold- 
ing-doors ; and in placing the seal upon the two lips of 
the chink, in the case of cupboards and of single doors. 

“Let’s pass on to this room, ^now,” said Fraisier, 
pointing to the door of Schmucke’s chamber, which 
opened into the dining-room. 

“ Why, that is monsieur’s own room !” exclaimed 
Dame Sauvage, rushing forward and placing herself 
between the door and the men of law. 

“ Here is the lease of the apartments,” said the hid- 
eous Fraisier. “ We found it among the papers, and it is 
not made out in the names of Messieurs Pons and 
Schmucke, but in the name of Monsieur Pons alone. 
The whole suite of rooms forms part of the succes- 
sion, and — moreover,” added he, opening tlie door of 
Schmucke’s chamber, “ look, Monsieur le Juge de Paix, 
the room is full of pictures.” 

“ So it is,” said the juge de paix^ thus at once giving 
judgment in favor of Fraisier. 


412 


‘‘fraisier’s fruit.” 


CHAPTER XXX. 

“fraisier's fruit.”* 

‘‘ Stop a moment, gentlemen,” said Villemot. “ Do 
you suj)pose that you will be allowed to turn the univer- 
sal legatee out of house and home, while his right to 
that character is as yet uncontested ?” 

“But it is contested,” said Fraisier ; “we oppose the 
delivery of the bequest.” 

“ Upon what grounds ?” 

“You shall soon learn, young_ man !” said Fraisier, 
satirically. “We do not, as matters now stand, refuse 
permission to the legatee to remove from this room 
whatever he is prepared to claim as his own private 
property ; but placed under seal the room must be ; and 
this gentleman may e’en go and find shelter wherever 
he chooses.” 

“Not so,” said Villemot. “Monsieur Schmucke will 
continue to occupy his own room !” 

“ How so, pray ?” 

“ Why,” replied Villemot, “ I shall apply for an inter- 
locutory judgment, with a view to obtaining a declara- 
tion that we are joint lessees of these apartments, and 
you sha’n’t turn us out of them. Remove the pictures ; 
separate that which belonged to the deceased from my 
client’s property, if you like — but here my client shall 
remain !” 

* The reader will bear in mind that Fraisier means a straw- 
beriy plant. 


“fraisier’s fruit.” 


413 


Young man !" 

“ I will go away !” said the old musician, whose 
energies returned to him when he heard this disgusting 
altercation. 

“You had better !” said Fraisier. “ It will save you 
some expense, for you would lose the day — the lease is 
perfectly regular.” 

“ The lease ! the lease !” cried Villemot. “ What’s 
the use of talking about the lease. 'Tis a question of 
bond-fides — ” 

“ 'Tis a question that cannot be determined, like a 
criminal case, by the evidence of ordinary witnesses. 
Are you prepared to involve yourselves in a maze of 
reports, verifications, interlocutory judgments, and an 
independent suit ?” 

“ No ! no !” cried Schmucke ; “ I will degamp ; I will 
go away.” 

Schmucke’s life — though Schmucke himself was 
unconscious of the fact — was that of a cynic philosopher, 
so extreme was its simplicity. His whole outfit con- 
sisted of two pairs of shoes, one pair of boots, two com- 
plete suits, twelve shirts, twelve neckcloths, twelve hand- 
kerchiefs, four undervests, and a superb pipe, which 
Pons had given him, together with an embroidered 
tobacco-pouch. Roused by the fever, of indignation to 
an abnormal pitch of excitement, he went into his room, 
and collecting all his baggage, placed it on a chair. 

“ All dat is mine !” said he, with a simplicity worthy 
of Cincinnatus. “ De biano also is mine.” 

“Madame,” said Fraiser to Dame Sauvage, ‘‘get 
some onedo help you to remove this piano, and place it 
on the landing.” 

“ You are a great deal too harsh,” said Villemot to 
Fraisier ; “ Monsieur le Juge de Paix has the exclusive 


414 


“fkaisier’s fruit.’’ 


right to order what is to be done ; he is sovereign judge 
in this matter.” 

“ There is valuable property there,” said the registrar, 
pointing to the room. 

“ Besides, monsieur quits the apartments of his own 
free will and pleasure,” remarked the juge de paix. 

“ I never saw such a client in all my life !” said the 
indignant Villemot, turning round upon Schmucke. 
“You are as soft as pulp.” 

“ What does it matter where one dies,” said Schmucke 
as he retired from the apartments. “ Dese men have 
digers’ fazes — I will zend for my boor trifles.” 

“ Where is monsieur going to ?” 

“ Wherever Got bleazes !” replied the universal lega- 
tee, with a gesture of indifference that was sublime. 

“ Take care to let me know,” said Villemot. 

^'‘ Follow himP whispered Fraisier to the chief clerk. 

Mme. Cantinet was appointed guardian of the seals ; 
and out of the cash found upon the premises she received 
an advance of fifty francs. 

“All goes well,” remarked Fraisier to M. Vitel as soon 
as Schmucke was out of hearing. “ If you are prepared 
to resign your office in my favor, go and call upon 
Madame de Marville ; you will have no difficulty in 
arranging matters with her.” 

“Your antagonist is a man of dough !” said the juge 
de paix, pointing to Schmucke, who had halted in the 
court to take one last long lingering look at the windows 
of the apartments. 

“Yes, the thing is safe now,” replied Fraisier. “You 
need not hesitate to marry your granddaughter to Pou- 
lain ; he will be chief physician to the Quinze-Vingts 
Hospital.” 

“We’ll see about it. Good-bye, Monsieur Fraisier,” 


‘‘fraisier’s fruit/^ 


415 


said the juge de paix, with an air of jolly good-fellow- 
ship. 

“ There is a man of talent for you !” said the registrar. 
“ He will travel far — the knowing dog.” 

It was now eleven o’clock. Mechanically did the old 
German glide into the route that he and Pons used to 
pursue together ; and as he paced along he thought of 
Pons ; Pons’ image was perpetually before his mind ; 
Pons seemed to be walking at his side. 

Just as Schmucke reached the front of his theatre, out 
popped Topinard, who had just finished cleaning the 
lamps of all the brackets. While thus engaged he had 
been pondering over the tyranny of the manager. 

“ Ah ! dis is exactly what I wanted !” cried Schmucke, 
stopping the poor supernumerary. “ Dobinard, you 
have a lodging, have you not?” 

“ Yes, monsieur.” 

“ A home of your own ?” 

“Yes, monsieur.” 

“Can you give me board and lodging? Oh ! I shall 
be a goot paymaster ; I have an income of nine hun- 
dred francs — and then I have not long to liff. I shall 
giff you ferry little trouble. I can eat almost anything ! 
My bibe is my only bassion. And zince you are de only 
berzon who has zhared my grief for de deat of Bons, I 
lofe you !” 

“ I should be only too glad to do as you wish, mon- 
sieur ; but I must tell you that Monsieur Gaudissard has 
given me a fine wigging — ” 

“ A wigging ?” 

“I mean that he has soused my head — 

“ Zouzed your head ?” 

“ Yes ; scolded me for taking an interest in you ; 
therefore, if you come to live with me, we must keep it 


416 


“fraisier’s fruit.’’ 


very dark ! But I doubt whether you would stay with 
me ; for little do you know what the home of a poor devil 
such as I am is like.” 

“ I brefer de humble home of a man of feeling who 
has mourned for Bons to de Tuileries in de zoziety of 
men wid de faces of tigers. I have just left Bons’ 
rooms full of tigers who are going to defour eferyting !” 

“ Come along with me, monsieur,” said the supernum- 
erary, “ and see for yourself. But — Well, after all, 
there is aloft — Let us consult Madame Topinard.” 

Schmucke followed Topinard as a sheep follows its 
shepherd. Topinard conducted him into one of those 
frightful localities that might fitly be termed the cancers 
of Paris. This spot is called Bordin Town. ’Tis a nar- 
row passage lined by houses such as builders run updiSa. 
matter of speculation. It has an outlet into the Rue de 
Bondy, in that part of the street which is overshadowed 
by the immense pile of the Porte-Saint-Martin Theatre 
— one of the warts of Paris. This passage, the path of 
which is hollowed out and sunk below the level pave- 
ment of the street, slopes steeply down toward 'the Rue 
des Mathurins-du-Temple. The town is bounded by an 
inner street which runs at right angles to the main street, 
so that the two streets together form a T. These two 
narrow Tows of buildings contain about thirty houses 
six or seven stories high. In the inner courts of these 
houses, and in each of the tenements into which they are 
divided, there is a shop, a work-room, or a manufactory 
of some kind or other. In fact, Bordin Town is the 
Faubourg Saint Antoine in miniature. Here there is a 
furniture-maker, there a brass-cutter ; here theatrical 
costumes are fashioned, there a glass-blower or a chirl^- 
painter has fixed his quarters ; in short, Bordin Town 
turns out from its dim recesses the article Paris in all its 


‘‘fraisier’s fruit. 


417 


fanciful varieties. This passage, like Commerce itself, 
is dingy but productive. It swarms with passengers, 
carts and drays'. Its aspect is repellent, and in strict 
keeping with its aspect is the teeming population of the 
place — a manufacturing population, whose dexterity in 
handicraft is counterbalanced by the stupidity that 
handicraft engenders. It was on account of the lowness 
of the rents that Topinard had pitched his tent in this 
quarter, which, from an industrial point of view, might 
be called a flourishing quarter. His abode was situated 
in the second house on the left-hand side of the entry. 
The rooms he occupied were upon the sixth floor, and 
looked out upon that belt of gardens which still exist as 
appendages to the three or four large mansions that are 
to be found in the Rue de Bondy. 

Topinard’s apartments consisted of a kitchen and two 
other rooms. The first of these was the children’s room, 
and contained two little bedsteads of white wood and a 
cradle. The second room was occupied by Topinard 
and his spouse. The kitchen did duty both as a break- 
fast-room and a dining-room. Above these apartments 
there was a kind of attic, six feet high, roofed with 
zinc, and having a sky-light for a window. Access 
to this attic was obtained by means of a staircase 
of white wood — a staircase which in builders’ slang 
would be called a miller s ladder." This room, which 
was intended for a servant’s room, entitled Topinard’s 
lodgings to be styled a complete suite, and raised the 
rental to the sum-total of four hundred francs. At the 
entrance to the apartments there was a kind of arched 
vestibule, lighted by a small round window in the wall 
of the kitchen and formed by the junction of the outer 
door of the kitchen and the door of the first room — three 
doors in all. This vestibule served to conceal the 


418 


fraisier’s fruit.” 


kitchen. A family of five persons (three of whom were 
children) found shelter in these apartments, which were 
hung with hideous paper at six sous the piece, floored 
with bricks, garnished with fire-places of that particular 
description called fire-places ^ la capucme^ and painted 
with common paint, to imitate w^ood. The deep 
scratches inflicted on such portions of the walls as were 
w’ithin reach of the children’s arms may be readily imag- 
ined ; but the rich would find a difficulty in picturing to 
themselves the simplicity of the kitchen range, which 
consisted of a meat-hastener, a boiler, a gridiron, a stew- 
pan, two or three coffee-pots and a frying-pan. The 
crockery, of white and brown earthen-ware, was worth 
at least twelve francs. The table did duty both as a 
kitchen table and a dining-room table into the bargain. 
The furniture consisted of a couple of chairs and a cou- 
ple of stools. The stock of wood and coal was stowed 
away beneath the cooking-stove, while in another corner 
of the room stood the tub, wherein, at night-time, the 
family linen underwent frequent lavation. The room in 
which the children found a local habitation was traversed 
by clothes-lines and adorned with playbills and with 
engravings extracted from newspapers or from the pros- 
pectuses of illustrated works. It was obvious that the 
elder little Topinard (whose school-books encumbered 
one corner of the room) acted as superintendent of the 
household when six o’clock came and father and mother 
were called away to the theatre. In full many an hum- 
ble family, a child of six or seven years is called upon to 
play the part of mother in relation to its sister and 
brothers. 

This slight sketch will suffice to show that the Topin- 
ards were (as the now proverbial saying runs) poor but 
honest. Topinard was about forty years old, and his 


“fraisier’s fruit.” 


419 


companion (who had formerly been a chorus leader at 
the theatre, and mistress of the insolvent manager, Gau- 
dissard’s immediate predecessor) was about thirty. 
Lolotte had been a handsome woman ; but the misfor- 
tunes which overtook the late manager had reacted upon 
her to such an extent that she found herself reduced to 
the necessity of contracting a (stage) marriage with 
Topinard. She entertained no doubt that, so soon as 
the joint savings of herself and her companion should 
reach the sum-total of a hundred and fifty francs, Topin- 
ard would fulfill his vows by making her his lawful wife 
— were it only for the sake of legitimatizing his children, 
whom he idolized. When Mme. Topinard had any 
leisure time in the morning she plied her needle for the 
wardrobe of the theatre. By dint of superhuman labor 
these two courageous supernumeraries contrived between 
them to realize an annual income of nine hundred francs. 

When Topinard and Schmucke had reached the third 
floor, Topinard, as each fresh flight of stairs presented 
itself, cried out to his companion by way of encourage- 
ment : story more!” But so profound was 

Schmucke’s sorrow that he did not even know whether 
he were going up-stairs or down. 

At the moment when Topinard, who, like all persons 
of his degree, was dressed in white holland, opened the 
door of the room, the voice of Mme. Topinard was heard 
exclaiming: “Come now! children, be quiet, here comes 
papa !” And since the children, no doubt, did exactly 
what they pleased with papa^ the eldest continued to 
command a charge— a souvenir of the Cirque Olympique 
— with the broom-stick as a \yar-horse, while the second 
went on blowing a tin whistle, and the third brought up 
the rear-guard of the army as well as his little legs 


420 


‘‘ fraisier’s fruit.” 

would let him. The mother, meanwhile, was busy 
stitching a theatrical costume. 

“ Silence,” shouted Topinard in a formidable voice 
“Silence, or I shall strike !” (“I am always obliged to 

say that to them,” he whispered to Schmucke.) 

“Look here, my darling,” said the supernumerary to 
the box-opener, ” here is Monsieur Schmucke, the friend 
of that poor Monsieur Pons. He does not know where 
to go to, and would like to live with us. I warned him 
that we were anything but swells, that we lived on a 
sixth story, and had nothing better than a loft to offer 
him ; but it was all to no purpose ; he had set his heart 
upon it — ” 

Schmucke meanwhile had seated himself in the chair 
which the woman had brought forward for him ; and 
the children, cowed by the advent of a stranger, had 
formed a little group and betaken themselves to the 
silent, exhaustive, but rapid scrutiny characteristic of 
childhood, which, like the dog, is guided by instinct 
rather than by reason. Schmucke, on his part, fell to 
studying this graceful little group ; one member of 
which — the trumpeter — was a little girl with magnificent 
light hair. 

“Zhe looks like a little German girl !” said Schmucke, 
beckoning the child to come to him. 

“The gentleman will be very uncomfortable in the 
loft,” said the box-opener. “If I were not obliged to 
keep the children under my eye, I would gladly offer 
him our room.” i 

She then opened the door of her own room and 
ushered Schmucke into it. . This room contained all the 
luxury that the establishment could boast. There was 
a mahogany bedstead furnished with curtains of blue 
calico fringed with white. The window-curtains also 


^^fraisier’s fruit.” 


421 


were made of blue calico of the same kind and pattern. 
The chest of drawers, writing-table and chairs, though 
all of them were of plain mahogany, were in apple-pie 
order. On the mantel-shelf there were a time-piece and 
two candelabra — articles which had evidently been pre- 
sented to Lolotte in former days by the bankrupt 
manager, whose portrait, an execrable daub by Pierre 
Grassou, hung upon the wall above the chest of drawers. 
It was natural enough that the children, forbidden as 
they were to enter this sanctum, should seize this chance 
of catching a stolen glimpse of it. 

“ Now, monsieur would be very comfortable here^' 
said the box-opener. 

“No, no!” replied Schmucke. “ Ah, no ; my days 
are numbered ; all I need is some nook wherein to die.” 

The door of the sanctum having been closed, the party 
mounted to the attic. Directly Schmucke reached it, he 
exclaimed : “Ah 1 dat is egzactly what I want. Before 
I went to live wid Bons I was never better lodged dan 
dat.” 

“Very well, then; all we have to do is to buy a 
truckle-bed, a couple of mattresses, a bolster, a pillow, 
two chairs and a table. That won’t kill any one — it 
may come to a hundred and fifty francs ; basin, jug and 
a small carpet for the bed-side included.” 

So the whole matter was arranged ; only — the 
hundred and fifty francs were not forthcoming. 

But as Schmucke was within a stone’s-throw of the 
theatre, it very naturally occurred to him, seeing how 
poor his new friends were, to go thither and claim the 
salary due to him from the manager. So to the theatre 
he forthwith repaired and there found Gaudissard. 

The manager received Schmucke with the somewhat 
overstrained politeness which he habitually displayed 


422 


feaisier’s fruit.” 


toward the artists of his theatre, and was astonished 
at Schmucke’s demanding a month’s salary. Neverthe- 
less, his claim appearing, on examination, to be 
well-founded, the manager exclaimed : 

“ Well ! deuce take it, my worthy friend ! The Ger- 
mans, it seems, always know how to reckon, even when 
they are in tears. I thought you would have been 
sensible of my present of a thousand francs — a full 
years salary — which I sent you, and that it would make 
us quits !” 

“ We did not receive a zingle farding,” said the 
worthy German ; “ and if I have applied to you for 
money it is because I am in de street and have not one 
farding. To whom did you intrust de brezent ?” 

“To your portress !’’ 

“To Madame Zibod !’’ exclaimed the musician. 
“ Why, she killed Bons — robbed him, zold him. She 
tried to burn his will. She is a fillain, a monz- 
der !’’ 

“ But, my good fellow, how comes it that you are in 
the street and without a shelter when you are the uni- 
versal legatee. That is not logical, as we say.” 

“ Dey turned me out-of-doors. I am a foreigner. I 
know noting of your law — ’’ 

“ Poor old man !’’ thought Gaudissard, who foresaw 
what was likely to be the issue of so unequal a combat. 
“ Now, listen to me,” said he, aloud. “ Shall I tell you 
what you ought to do ?” 

V I have an agent.” 

“Well, then ; enter into a compromise with the 
legal heirs at once. They will give you a certain 
sum down, and an annuity, and you will live in 
peace — ” 

“ Dat is all I want !” replied Schmucke. 


fraisier’s fruit.” 


423 


“Well, then, leave me to make the necessary arrange- 
ments on your behalf,” said Gaudissard, to whom 
Fraisier, on the previous evening, had imparted his 
modus operandi. 

Gaudissard’s idea was that he would be able to 
ingratiate himself with the youthful Viscountess Pop- 
inot and her mother by bringing this dirty piece of 
business to a conclusion. “ I shall be a councilor of 
state, at the very least,” said he to himself. 

“ You have my authority to act for me — ” 

“ Well, then, just let’s see how matters stand. In the 
first place, here are a hundred pounds,” said the 
Napoleon of the boulevard theatres, taking from his 
pocket fifteen louis and presenting them to the old 
musician. “ Those belong to you ; 'tis six months 
salary in advance. You can return them to me in 
case of your throwing up the theatre. Now, let us 
reckon ; what are your annual expenses ? What do you 
require to live upon comfortably ? Come now, arrange 
for a Sardanapalian existence !” 

“ I only want a summer suit and a winter suit — ” 

“Three hundred francs,” said Gaudissard. 

“ Shoes, four pairs — ” 

“ Sixty francs.” 

“ Stockings.” 

“Twelve pairs — that’s thirty-six francs.” 

“ Six shirts.” 

“ Six calico shirts, twenty-four francs ; the satme num- 
ber of linen ones, forty-eight ; say seventy-two francs. 
We have got to four hundred and sixty-eight francs ; 
let’s say five hundred francs, including neckcloths and 
handkerchiefs ; then one hundred francs for washing — 
six hundred francs. Now, what do you require to live 
upon ? Three francs a day .?” 


424 “ fraisier's fruit.” 

“ No, dat is too much !” 

“ Well, but you will have to buy hats. That makes 
fifteen hundred francs ; and five hundred francs for rent, 
two thousand. Would you like me to procure you an 
annuity of two thousand francs, well secured ?” 

“ Den, dere is my tobacco.” 

“Two thousand four hundred francs! Ah, Daddy 
Schmucke. You call it tobacco^ do you ? Well, you shall 
have your tobacco. Then the annuity is to be two thous- 
and four hundred francs.” 

“ Dat is not all. I want a zertain zum in ready 
money !” 

(“Ah! The premium of course! Oh, these Ger- 
mans ! They call themselves simple ! The old Robert 
Macaire,” said Gaudissard to himself.) “Well, what do 
you want ?” repeated he. “ But, mind you, this must be 
all.” 

“ I want de money to bay a zagred debt,” said 
Schmucke. 

(“ A debt, eh ?” said Gaudissard to himself. “ What a 
rascal it is ! Why, he’s worse than a young hopeful ! 
He’s going to invent some bills of exchange now ! We 
shall have to put a stop to this. This Fraisier don’t take 
a comprehensive view of things !) “ What debt are you 

referring to, my good fellow ? Say on !” 

“ Dere is but one man who zhared my grief for Rons’ 
death ; he has a nice little girl with magnificent hair ; 
zhe reminded me, at onze, of de genius of my dear Ger- 
many, which I ought never to have left. Baris is not 
goot for de Germans. Dey only get laughed at here 1” 
said Schmucke, nodding his head with the air of one 
who is thoroughly persuaded that he has a clear insight 
into the ways of this wicked world. 

“ He is mad,” said Gaudissard to himself. 


fraisier’s fruit.” 


425 


And a tear stole to the eye of the manager, who felt a 
twinge of compassion for the inoffensive, artless old 
man. 

“Ah \ you understand me, Monzir le Tirecdir ! Well, 
dis man wit de little girl is Dobinard ; Dobinard who 
attends to de orgeztra, and lights de lamps. Bons liked 
him and used to help him. He is de only berzon who 
followed de funeral of my only friend to de church and 
to de zemetery. I want tree touzand francs for him and 
tree touzand francs for de little girl — “ 

“ Poor man !” said Gaudissard, aside. 

Relentless parvenu as he was, Gaudissard was touched 
by Schmucke’s magnanimity, and by his gratitude for 
an act which, though it would have seemed the veriest 
trifle in the eyes of the world, outweighed (like Bos- 
suet’s glass of water) the victories of conquerors in the 
estimation of this meek and humble Christian. Beneath 
all Gaudissard’s vanity, beneath his burning thirst for 
success, beneath his fierce desire to place himself on a 
level with his friend Count Popinot, there lay a good 
heart and a kindly disposition. He therefore rescinded 
his rash judgment in regard to Schmucke and passed 
over to his side. 

“You shall have all you ask for. But, my dear 
Schmucke, I will do even more than that ; Topinard is 
a man of integrity, is he not ?” 

“ Oh, yes ; I saw him but now in his humble home, 
where he lives contentedly among his children.” 

“ I will give him the post of treasurer — for Daddy 
Baudrand is on the point of leaving us.” 

“ Oh, may Got bless you !” exclaimed Schmucke. 

“ Well, then, my good and worthy fellow, join me at 
four o'clock this afternoon at the house of Berthier, the 
notary ; all shall be in readiness, and you will be beyond 


426 


GONCI.USION. 


the reach of want for the rest of your days. You shall 
have your six thousand francs, and you shall hold the 
same position under Garangeot as you held under Pons, 
and at the same salary.” 

“ No,” said Schmucke, “ I shall not liff ; I have no 
heart for anyting ; I feel dat my healt is undermined.” 

“ Poor sheep !” moralized Gaudissard, as he bowed 
to the departing Schmucke. “Well, after all, one lives 
on mutton cutlets ; and as the sublime Beranger puts 
it : ‘ Poor sheep, poor sheep, ye are doomed to be 

shorn!’” and humming this political opinion with a 
view to subduing his emotion, the manager told the 
office page to send his carriage round. 

When he had reached the foot of the staircase, he called 
out to the coachman : “Rue de Hanovre.” The man 
of ambition had reappeared in his totality. The coun- 
cil of state loomed before his eyes. 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

CONCLUSION. 

While Gaudissard was on his way to the Rue de 
Hanovre, Schmucke was engaged in buying some flow- 
ers and cakes for Topinard’s children. His heart was 
almost light as he took these offerings home ; and, as 
he uttered the words : “ I make you a present of de 

gakes,” a smile played upon his lips which for three 
long months had known no smile — a smile that would 
have made an observer shudder. 


CONCLUSION. 


427 


“ I make you a present of de gakes on one gondition.” 

“ You are too good, monsieur,” said the mother. 

“ De little girl must giff me a kiss, and put de flowers 
in her hair and arrange her hair as de little German 
girls do.” 

“ Olga, my child, do exactly what this gentleman asks 
you,” said the box-opener, with an air of severity. 

“ Don’t speak grossly to my little German girl,” 
pleaded Schmucke ; for the sight of the little creature 
brought his dear Germany before his eyes. 

“Three commissionaires are on their way herewith 
all the rattle-traps upon their shoulders,” said Topinard, 
bursting into the room. 

“ Ah !” said the German. “ Here are two hundred 
francs to pay for them all, my friend. But — you have 
a gentle greature for your mate ; you will marry her, 
won’t you ? I will giff you tree tousand francs ; de lit- 
tle girl shall have a marriage bortion of tree tousand 
francs, which you can invest in her name. And you are 
not to be a supernumerary any longer — you are to be de 
treasurer of de teatre.” 

“/to have Daddy Baudrand’s place ?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Who told you so ?” 

“ Monsir Cautissard.” 

“ Oh ! it’s enough to make one mad with*joy ! Here, 
Rosalie, I say, won’t the folks at the theatre be vexed ! 
But it can't be true,” he added. 

“ Our benefactor mustn’t be huddled away in an 
attic.” 

“ Bah ! for the few days dat I have to liff it will be 
quite goot enough,” said Schmucke. “ Goot-bye. I am 
going to de zemetery to see what dey have done wit 
Bons, and to order zome flowers for his grafe.” 


428 


CONCLUSION. 


Mme. Camusot meanwhile was a prey to the liveliest 
alarms. Fraisier, Godeschal and Berthier were in con- 
sultation at her house. Berthier the notary, and Gode- 
schal the solicitor, considered that the will drawn up by 
two notaries in the presence of two witnesses was (in 
consequence of the clear and concise manner in which it 
had been framed by Leopold Hannequin) quite beyond 
the reach of attack. According to the worthy Gode- 
schal, Schrq?ucke, even if his present adviser succeeded 
in throwing dust in his eyes, would, sooner or later, 
learn how matters really stood ; were it only from the 
lips of one of those advocates, who, in order to distin- 
guish themselves, have recourse to acts of generosity and 
delicacy. The two ministerial officers, therefore, ere 
they quitted the house of Mme. Camusot, advised her to 
beware of Fraisier, about whose character they had, very 
naturally, instituted certain inquiries. While this cau- 
tion was being given, Fraisier, who had just returned 
from witnessing the apposition of the seals, was drawing 
up a summons in the president’s study, into which he 
had been ushered by Mme. Camusot at the instigation 
of the two ministerial officers to whom the whole affair 
seemed (to use their own expression) too dirty for a 
president to meddle with, and who were consequently 
anxious to express their opinion to Mme. Camusot with- 
out being overheard by Fraisier. 

“ Well, madame, what has become of the two gentle- 
men ?” inquired the quondam solicitor of Mantes. 

“ Why, they have flown, after giving me a parting 
recommendation to throw up the whole concern !” 
replied Mme. de Marville. 

“ Throw it up T exclaimed Fraisier, in accents of con- 
centrated rage. “Just listen to this, madame.” 

And so saying, he read aloud the following document : 


CONCLUSION. 


429 


“ On the petition of etc., etc. (I omit the verbiage.) 
Whereas, a will has been deposited in the hands of Mon- 
sieur le President of the tribunal of first instance, which 
will was received by Maitre Leopold Hannequin and 
Maitre Alexandre Crottat, notaries of Paris, accompanied 
by two witnesses (to wit): Messieurs Brunner and 
Schwab, foreigners domiciled at Paris, by which said 
will Monsieur Pons (deceased) has disposed of his estate 
to the prejudice of the petitioner his lawdul and natural 
heir, and in favorof one Monsieur Schmucke, a German ; 

“And whereas, the petitioner undertakes to prove that 
the said will is the outcome of the most odious undue 
influence, and the result of manoeuvres which the law 
condemns ; and whereas, it will be shown by the evidence 
of certain eminent personages that the intention of the 
testator was to bequeath his fortune to Mademoiselle 
Cecile, daughter of the said Monsieur de Marville ; and 
the will which the petitioner claims to have set aside was 
extorted from the weakness of the testator when he was 
in a state of absolute imbecility : 

“And whereas, Monsieur Schmucke, with a view to 
procuring this universal bequest, kept the testator in the 
closest seclusion, and prevented the family of the testa- 
tor from obtaining access to his death-bed ; and more- 
over, when once he had achieved his object, proceeded 
to acts of flagrant ingratitude which scandalized the 
inhabitants of the house in which he dwelt and of the 
surrounding neighborhood, who were accidentally present 
in order to pay their last respects tp the porter of the 
house in which the testator died ; 

“ And whereas, facts of still graver import, facts of 
which the petitioner is at the present moment engaged 


480 


CONCLUSION. 


in obtaining proof, will be formally averred before the 
judges of the tribunal ; 

“ I, the undersigned bailiff, etc., etc., do hereby, in the 
said name, etc., etc., summon the said Monsieur 
Schmucke, etc., etc., to appear before the judges of the 
first chamber of the tribunal, to be present at the declara- 
tion that the will received by Maitres Hannequin and 
Crottat, being the outcome of the most conspicuous 
undue influence, will be regarded as void and of none 
effect, and I do moreover, in the said name protest 
against the quality and capacity of universal legatee 
which the said Monsieur Schmucke might assume, inas- 
much as I have heard the petitioner oppose, as in fact 
he does, by his petition of this day’s date presented to 
Monsieur le President, oppose the delivery of possession 
to the said Monsieur Schmucke, and I have left a copy 
of these presents (the costs of which amount to, etc., 
etc.) with him, etc., etc.” 

“Now, Madame la Presidente, I know my man ; and 
when he has read this billet-doux he will come to terms ; 
he’ll consult Tabareau, and Tabareau will tell him to 
accept our offer. Are you prepared to grant the annuity 
of three thousand francs ?” 

“ Undoubtedly. I only wish I were on the point of 
paying the first quarter of it.” 

“ That will be the case before three days are over our 
heads ; for this summons will overtake him when he is 
under the stunning influence of recent sorrow, for he 
regrets Pons, does the poor man. He took the loss very 
much to heart.” 

“ Can the summons, when once issued, be withdrawn 
said Mme. de Marville. 


CONCLUSION. 


431 


“Assuredly, madame ; it is always open to one to 
desist.” 

“ Well, then, you can go on, monsieur,” said Mme. de 
Marville. “ Pursue your course. Yes, the purchase 
which you have arranged for me is well worth the 
trouble. I have, moreover, settled the business of Vitel’s 
resignation, but you will pay Vitel his sixty thousand 
francs out of the proceeds of Pons’ estate. So, you see, 
success is essential.” 

“ You have his resignation ?” 

“ Yes, monsieur ; Monsieur Vitel relies upon Monsieur 
de Marville.” 

“ Very good, madame^; I have already released you 
from the payment of the sixty thousand francs which, I 
calculated, must be given to this vile portress, this 
Madame Cibot. But I still wish to secure the tobacco- 
shop for Madame Sauvage, and the nomination of my 
friend Poulain to the vacant post of chief physician to 
the Quinze-Vingts.” 

“ Agreed ! Everything is arranged.” 

“ Well, then, ’tis all settled,” said Fraisier. “ Every one 
is on your side in this matter ; even Gaudissard, the 
theatrical manager to whom I paid a visit yesterday, and 
who promised me that he would crush a certain super- 
numerary who might interfere with our projects.” 

“Oh, I know all about it. Monsieur Gaudissard is 
ready to do anything for the Popinots !” 

Fraisier now took leave of Mme. de Marville. Unfor- 
tunately, he did not meet Gaudissard, and the fatal sum- 
mons was launched without delay. 

The avaricious will comprehend, as readily as the 
upright will condemn, the elation of Mme. de Marville 
when, twenty minutes after Fraisier’s departure, Gaudis- 
sard arrived and informed her of his conversation with 


432 


CONCLUSION. 


poor Schmucke. Mme. de Marville indorsed with her 
approbation all that had been done ; and felt unbound- 
edly thankful to the manager for scattering all her com- 
punctious visitings of nature by sundry remarks which 
seemed to her to be full of good sense. 

“ As I was on my way hither, Madame la Presidente,” 
said Gaudissard, “it occurred to me that, after all, this 
poor devil wouldn’t know what on earth to do with his 
fortune. He is a being of patriarchal simplicity. He is 
artless, he is a German ; he really ought to be stuffed 
and put under a glass case like a little waxen image of 
our Saviour. I mean to say that, in my opinion, even as 
matters now stand, he scarcely knows what to do with 
his two thousand five hundred francs a year, and that 
you are supplying him with temptations to dissipa- 
tion — ” 

“ It shows,” said Mme. de Marville, “ a very noble 
heart to enrich the young man who is sorry for the death 
of our cousin. For my part, I deeply regret the little 
misunderstanding which set us at loggerheads — Mon- 
sieur Pons and me. If he had only come back, all would 
have been forgiven. If you only knew — my husband 
positively misses him. Monsieur de Marville was quite 
upset at not having been informed of his decease, for he 
has a religious regard for family duties ; he would 
have attended the service and followed the funeral even 
to the grave, and I myself would have been present at 
the funeral mass — ” 

“ Well, then, fair lady,” said Gaudissard ; “ will you 
be good enough to have the deed drawn up ? I will bring 
the German to you at four o’clock. Commend me, 
madame, to the good graces of your charming daughter 
the Viscountess Popinot ; and beg her to tell my illus- 
trious friend (her worthy and excellent father-in-law) 


CONCLUSION. 


433 


how thoroughly devoted I am to him and his ; and 
entreat him to continue his valuable favors to me. I 
owe my very existence to his uncle the judge, and my 
fortune to hint ; would that I might be indebted to you, 
madame, and to your daughter for that consideration 
which attaches to persons of influence and standing. I 
want to abandon the stage and become a man of solid 
position.” 

‘‘You are so already, monsieur,” said Mme. de Mar- 
ville. 

“ Charming !” exclaimed Gaudissard, as he kissed the 
lady’s skinny hand, and withdrew. 

At four o’clock there were gathered together in the 
private office of M. Berthier, the notary ; firstly, Fraiser 
(by whom the deed of compromise had been drawn up) ; 
secondly, Tabareau, Schmucke’s proxy ; and thirdly 
(piloted to the spot by Gaudissard), Schmucke himself. 
The six thousand francs which Schmucke had asked for 
and the six hundred francs of the first quarterly install- 
ment of the annuity, Fraisier had carefully arrayed in 
bank-notes upon the notary’s desk, under the very eyes 
of the poor German, who, dazzled by the sight of so 
much money, paid not the slightest attention to the 
reading of the document. Indeed, it must be confessed, 
that the poor fellow, whom Gaudissard had pounced 
upon just as he was returning from the cemetery (where 
he had talked to Pons and promised to rejoin him), was 
not in full possession of all his faculties, which had 
already been severely shaken by so many shocks. He 
took no heed, therefore, of the preamble of the deed, 
wherein he was represented as being assisted by Maitre 
TabareaU; his agent and adviser, and the grounds of the 
suit instituted by the president in the interests of his 
daughter were recapitulated. ’Twas a sorry part that 


434 


CONOLTJSION. 


the poor German was called upon to play ; forb}^ sign- 
ing the deed he admitted the justice of Fraisier’s fearful 
imputations. But Schmucke was so rejoiced at the 
sight of the money for Topinard’s family, and so happy 
in the thought of enriching, according to his contracted 
ideas, the only man who cared for Pons, that not one 
word of the compromise that was to terminate the suit 
reached his ears. 

In the very midst of the reading of the deed, a clerk 
came into the office and said to his employer : “ Mon- 
sieur, there is a man outside who wants to speak to 
Monsieur Schmucke.” 

At a gesture from Fraisier, the notary significantly 
shrugged his shoulders. 

“ Never interrupt us when engaged in signing deeds. 
Inquire the name of this — is it a man or a gentleman ? 
Is it a creditor ?” 

The clerk disappeared ; then returned and said : 
“ He insists upon speaking to Monsieur Schmucke.” 

“His name?” 

“ His name is Topinard.” 

“ I’ll go. Don’t hesitate to sign,” said Gaudissard to 
Schmucke. “ Conclude the matter. I’ll go and see 
what he wants with us.” 

Gaudissard had understood Fraisier’s gesture. Both 
of them suspected danger. 

“ What is it that brings you here ?” said the manager 
to the supernumerary. “ It would seem as if you didn’t 
care about being treasurer ? The principal qualification 
for a treasurer is — discretion.” 

“ Monsieur !” 

“Go and attend to your own business. You will 
never be anything if you meddle with that of others.” 

'‘Monsieur, I will not eat bread every mouthful of 


CONCLUSION. 


435 


which would stick in my throat. Monsieur Schmucke !” 
shouted he. 

At the sound of Topinard’s voice, Schmucke, who had 
signed the deed, came out with his money in his hand. 
“ Dis is for de little German girl and you,” said he. 

“ Oh ! my dear Monsieur Schmucke, you have been 
enriching a pack of monsters — a set of people who 
would rob you of your good name. See, I took that to 
a worthy man — a solicitor who knows this Fraisier — and 
he says that it is your duty to punish so much wicked- 
ness by defending the action, and that they will give 
way. Read.” 

And so saying, this imprudent friend gave Schmucke 
the summons which had been sent to him at Bordin 
Town. Schmucke took the paper, read it, and seeing 
how he was therein treated, and being an entire stranger 
to the amenities of legal procedure, received a mortal 
blow. This pehhle stopped the action of his heart, and 
he fell exhausted into the arms of Topinard. 

At the time when this happened the pair were stand- 
ing under the notary’s entrance gate-way ; so Topinard 
hailed a passing hackney-carriage and placed the poor 
German in it. Schmucke was suffering the pangs attend- 
ant on a serious congestion of the brain ; everything 
swam before his sight, but he had still strength to hold 
out the money to Topinard. 

Schmucke did not immediately succumb to this first 
attack ; but he never recovered his reason ; all his 
movements were purely automatic ; he ceased to eat, 
and, at the end of ten days, died without a murmur, for 
he could not speak. He was nursed by Mme. Topinard 
and buried obscurely at Topinard’s expense. Topinard 
was the only person who followed the body of this child 
of Germany to its last resting-place. 


CONCLU8IOX. 


Fraisier, who had been made a juge de paix, and is on 
the most intimate terms with the family of M. de Mar- 
ville, stands high in the esteem of Mme. la Presidente. 
She doos not wish him to marry Tabareau’s daughter, 
and promises to find a far better match for the able man 
to whom she is beholden, not for the acquisition of the 
pasture-land at Marville and the cottage only, but also 
for the election of M. de Marville, who .was returned to 
the chamber of deputies at the general election in 1846. 

Every one will, no doubt, be anxious to learn what 
became of the heroine of this history — a history the 
details of which are, alas, too true ; and which, taken in 
connection with its predecessor — its twin-sister. La 
Cousine Bette — proves that the chief of all social forces 
is character, That heroine is, as you, oh, ye amateurs, 
connoisseurs and dealer, will at once perceive, the Pons 
collection. In order to learn its fate, all we need do is 
to listen to a conversation which was held a few days 
since at the house of Count Popinot, when he was exhib- 
iting his magnificent collection to some foreigners. 

“ Monsieur le Comte,” said a distinguished foreigner, 
“you are the owner of treasures.” 

“Oh, my lord,” said Count Popinot, modestly, “so far 
as regards pictures, no one (I will not say in Paris, but) 
in Europe can lay to his soul the flattering unction that 
he can compete with a certain obscure individual, a Jew 
named Elie Magus, an aged maniac, the prince of pic- 
ture-maniacs. He has collected more than a hundred 
pictures such as to discourage amateurs from attempting 
to form collections. France ought really to sacrifice 
seven or eight millions of francs, and purchase this 
gallery when the rich old fellow dies. But as regards 
curiosities, my collection will bear talking about — ” 


CONCLUSION. 


437 


“ But how can a man so busy as you are, and whose 
original fortune was §d honorably acquired in trade — 

“ In the drug trade,” interposed Popinot. “ How can 
such a man, you would say, continue to dabble in — 
drugs ?” 

“ Nay,” replied the foreigner. “ But how do you find 
time to look for these things ? Curiosities don’t walk 
into your house.” 

“ My father-in-law had the nucleus of a collection 
before my marriage,” said the Viscountess Popinot. 
“ He loved the Arts, and was fond of masterpieces, but 
the principal part of his treasures came through me !” 

“Through you, madame ? Is it possible that one so 
young should have been infected with these vices?” 

The Russians are so imitative that all the evils of civil- 
ization find an echo with them. Bric-a-bracomania is 
quite the rage at St. Petersburg; and in consequence of 
the intrepidity which is natural to Russians, they have 
caused so great a rise in the article (as Remonencq 
would say) that collections will become impossible. 
This particular Russian prince had come to Paris simply 
and solely with a view to forming a collection. 

“ Prince,” said the Viscountess Popinot, “ this treasure 
came to me through the death of a cousin, who was very 
fond of me, and had spent upward of forty years 
(reckoning from 1805) in picking up in every land under 
the sun (and especially in Italy) all these masterpieces.” 

“ What was his name ?” inquired the nobleman. 

“ Pons,” replied President Camusot. 

“ He was a charming man,” said Mme. Camusot, in 
her dulcet falsetto ; “ a man of the greatest talent and 
originality, combined with much kindness of heart. 
This fan, which you admire, my lord, and which once 
belonged to Madame de Pompadour, was placed in my 


438 


CONCLUSION. 


hands one fine morning by Monsieur Pons, who accom- 
panied the gift with a charming fittle phrase, which you 
will pardon me for not repeating.” 

As Mme. de Marville uttered these words, she looked 
at her daughter. 

“Tell us what the little phrase was, Madame la 
Vicomtesse,” said the Russian prince. 

“The little phrase is worthy of the fan,” replied the 
viscountess (whose “little phrase” was stereotyped.) 
“ He said to my mother that it was high time that that 
which had been in the hands of Vice should be placed 
in the hands of Virtue.” 

The nobleman looked at Mme. Camusot de Marville 
with an air of doubt that was extremely flaterintg to so 
lean a lady. 

“ Monsieur Pons was so attached to us that he dined 
with us three or four times a week,” resumed Mme. 
Camusot ; “ we knew how to appreciate him, and artists 
enjoy the society of those who can appreciate their 
humor. My husband, moreover, was his only kinsman ; 
and when this fortune came to Monsieur de Marville, 
who in no way expected it. Monsieur Popinot chose to 
buy the whole collection rather than allow it to be sold 
by auction ; while we, for our part, preferred disposing 
of it in that way, for it would be so extremely painful to 
witness the dispersion of those beautiful things which 
afforded so much amusement to our dear cousin. Elie 
Magus acted as valuer on that occasion, and thus it was, 
my lord, that I was enabled to become the owner of the 
cottage built by your uncle, and in which we hope that 
you will do us the pleasure of being our guest.” 

A year has elapsed since Gaudissard transferred to 
other hands the license of the theatre over which he 
presided, but M. Topinard is still its treasurer. 


CONCLUSION. 


439 


Monsieur Topinard, however, has grown morose, misan- 
thropical and taciturn-; he is supposed to have com- 
mitted some crime ; while the ill-natured wags of the 
theatre maintain that his chagrin arises from his having 
married Lolotte. The very name of Fraisier makes the 
worthy Topinard start. It may perhaps be considered 
singular that the only heart worthy of Pons' should be 
round among the humblest employes of a boulevard 
theatre. 

The prediction of Mme. Fontaine made so forcible 
an impression upon Mme. Remonencq that she is 
unwilling to retire into the country, and remains in her 
magnificent shop on the Boulevard de la Madeleine. 
She is once more a widow. As a matter of fact, the 
Auvergnat, having taken the precaution to have the 
marriage contract so drawn up that all the property 
should go to the survivor, placed a liqueur glass of 
vitriol within his wife's reach, in the expectation that 
she would make a mistake. She, however, having, with 
the very best intentions in the world, changed the posi-. 
tion of the glass, it was Remonencq himself who swal- 
lowed its contents. This end — a fitting end for such a 
miscreant — is an argument in favor of the existence 
of Providence — that Providence which (on account 
perhaps of its too frequent introduction into dramatic 
catastrophes) painters of life are accused of forget- 
ting. 

Excuse the errors of the transcriber ! 


THE END. 


V 


Five Years 

WITH THE 

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Lame Back, Foundered Feet, 

Cracked Heels, Mange in Dogs. etc. 
Manufactured at Lockport, N. Y., by 
MERCHANT’S GARGLING OIL CO. 

JOHN HODGE. Sec’y. 


Mothers, Save Your Children 

from diphtheria and other contagious diseases by using in your Nursery, 
Bath, and Sleeping Rooms the SHERMAN “KING’* VAPORIZER, 
the ONLV ContinnonM and Absolute Disinfectant 

KNOWN, PROVED, AND WARRANTED. 

With its use, Cooking Odors, and that deadly, secret, invisible enemy, 
^ewer Gas, and all other Noxious Vapors, are rendered harmless. 

Pure Air 


INSURED BY USING 

The Sherman “ King” Vaporizei 

Self-Acting, 

Continuous, Inexpensive, Reliable. 

ALL IMPURE AND OFFENSIVE ODORS 
ABSOLUTELY REMOVED. 

Each Vaporizer sold is cliarged for use. 
Nocnre except to replenish once in two 
months, at expense of4 to 8 cents, nccord- 
iiig to size. Three sizes, S3, 30, S3. 00, 
S8.00. illustrated Pamphlet free. 
SHERMAN “KINa” VAPORIZER COMPANY, 
Chicopee Falls, Mass. ; Boston, New York, 
Philadelphia, or Chicago. 









'( IN 


nave eouno it 


^ I ■! L± u 1. -■ ■■ ■■- II ■: 11 M ’I II II II 'i II n_y |i II i| .1 n nil :i i; ■ « - .^Tl I' — WX— i<— — ^ 

LONDON lOO YEARS, INTERNATIONAL AWARDS, 


r.'^ 1 BRIUHT HEALTHFUL SKIN AND COSIPLEXION ENSURED B¥ USINH 

I PEARS’ SOAP. 

S' AS RECOMMENDED BY THE GREATEST ENGLISH AUTHORITY ON THE SKIN, 

Prof. SIR ERASMUS WILSON, 7?. 5, Pres, of the Royal Col. of Surgeons, 
England, and ALL other Leading Authorities on the Skin. 


AND PREFER PEARS* SOAP TO ANY O THER. 
Thefollowingfrom the world-renowned Songstress is asample of thousands of Testimonials. 
Testimonial /rom Madame ADEIANA PATTI, " 

“T HAVE FOUND IT MATCHLESS FOR ^ ^ ^ 

1 THE HANDS AND COMPLEXION” ^ - c/ZZ' 

^e&rs* Soap is for Sa.le through- 

the Civilized World, 




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